Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine program
As the founding college of osteopathic medicine, ATSU-KCOM students receive comprehensive medical education that includes access to the latest technology, including high fidelity human patient simulators, simulated patient encounters and point of care ultrasound. The Complete Doctor, a hallmark of the KCOM curriculum, incorporates early clinical experiences with didactic study in physical exam skills, communication skills, social determinants of health, spirituality in medicine, medical jurisprudence and ethics.
ATSU-KCOM students engage in four years of academic study. Reflecting the osteopathic philosophy, the curriculum emphasizes preventive medicine and holistic patient care including the use of osteopathic principles and techniques. Students spend two years studying integrated basic and clinical sciences in a campus setting. These courses are patient-oriented and integrate biomedical and clinical sciences through didactics, labs, workshops, case-presentations, team-based activities and simulations. Third and fourth year students are educated through clinical rotations in one of KCOM’s national regions, which include sites in Arizona, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Utah.
KCOM graduates are selected to highly prestigious residency programs across the nation, including Yale, Johns Hopkins University, Genesys Regional Medical Center, the Mayo Clinic, and Cleveland Clinic Foundation. With an emphasis in primary care and rural health, KCOM graduates enter family medicine, internal medicine, pediatrics and psychiatry, as well as a variety of specialties such as anesthesiology, dermatology, emergency medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, and surgery.
ATSU-KCOM graduates represent a diverse group of osteopathic physicians practicing in every state and internationally.
Review the Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine fact sheet (pdf).
Graduate medical education and placement
As students complete their four years in an osteopathic medical school, he/she will apply to and “match” into a residency training program system, known as “Graduate Medical Education” (GME). Upon graduation from the school, DOs begin specialty training in focused disciplines ranging from family medicine, internal medicine, pediatrics, general surgery, orthopedics and emergency medicine, just to name a few. “Resident” physicians grow in knowledge and skill through both formal didactic education and by providing care to patients, while being supervised by experts in their particular field. After demonstrating their competency over the 3 to 7 years of residency training, residents who successfully complete their training program are eligible to take specialty certification boards in their chosen discipline.
ATSU-KCOM graduates are recognized and highly desired by all types of residency training programs across the country. To see where our graduates have matched into residency review the Graduate Placement brochure.
