“Osteopathic profession booming,” says MSU dean. “Diverse experiences empower our entire curriculum”

<p>“The osteopathic profession is really booming right now,” Amalfitano tells Beekman. “It's the fastest growing of the health professions. One in five graduates of a medical school right now is graduating from a DO medical school. <a href="http://com.msu.edu">One of those is ours</a>. And then one in four medical students entering medical school this year in the United States is entering an osteopathic medical school.</p><p>“And that primarily stems from our history and philosophical tenants of how we view individuals and our longstanding, over-130-year history of trying to preserve health and prevent illness rather than treat symptoms and send patients on their way. It's what we call a holistic view to anybody who seeks us out for care.</p><p>“We just celebrated our 50-year anniversary. We have about 7,000 alumni of which, at last count, about 65-70 percent, depending on how you want to count it, actually practice in the State of Michigan. And the majority of those graduates are in primary care, so pediatrics, family practice, and internal medicine. And you can add psychiatry and even emergency room medicine; many times our doctors are out in rural areas providing primary care.</p><p>“We've graduated more doctors, let's say since 2014, who self-identify as a minority, than any other medical school in the state, based on public data. We've got a long way to go on this, and I'm not saying that we've got an answer, but we pride ourselves in trying to meet that challenge. We're going to be stepping up to that in the coming years, and hopefully we'll be able to even broaden that capacity. We’re following the proverbial land grant mission of this university to serve the people of Michigan. I can't think of a better way than providing them physicians to help in that.”</p><p>Amalfitano tells Beekman about the college’s research foci and about his own work harnessing viruses to use them as potential treatments.</p><p>“I actually developed a virus that we inactivated. It's a common cold virus. We took the DNA ou