DMU podiatric medical students Ali Binder and Amy Kruger recently shared with me the latest edition of “Footnotes,” the representative newsletter for the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery (CPMS). The newsletter’s goal is to provide students with information about the University, club activities, reviews of restaurants, shops and movies, and to develop an overall feeling of connectedness throughout the CPMS. I found it to be an enlightening read, including an article by James Whelan, CPMS student government president, describing efforts by the American Association of Colleges of Podiatric Medicine (AACPM) to increase the number of podiatric residencies.
James points to an an AACPM video on YouTube in which Edwin Wolf, D.P.M., M.S., the organization’s national residency facilitator, describes these efforts. Increasing podiatric residencies will benefit the nation as well as podiatric medical graduates: According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, as noted in the video, “podiatric medicine needs to grow 16 percent from now until 2014 to keep pace with an aging and diabetes-prolific U.S. population.”
To train the podiatric workforce, Wolf says the AACPM has a goal of increasing residency positions to reach 110 percent of graduating students every year. Such residencies are funded by the federal Medicare program, the major financier of graduate medical education in the U.S. Hospitals that begin or increase the number of podiatric residencies, then, gain financially as they provide more services to patients.
To ensure today’s podiatry students successfully match with a residency program, James advises them to “study and advance themselves in the classroom” to be academically competitive. He also suggests students consider “taking on leadership roles or participating in research or service projects.”
“Fortunately, the College of Podiatric Medicine and Surgery offers all of these things as a premier podiatric teaching institution that continues to yield both well prepared and knowledgeable students for residency,” he adds. “CPMS provides our student body with the tools necessary to succeed.”
Podiatric medicine is an exciting, expanding and much-needed profession. To learn more about the profession and CPMS, click here.
