With a greatly anticipated step in the accreditation process completed, PCOM South Georgia’s leadership team is planning a ribbon cutting ceremony which will take place on August 6, 2019 at 2 p.m. Georgia Governor Brian Kemp has confirmed that he will address attendees as the first four-year medical school in Southwest Georgia opens its doors.

 PCOM South Georgia consists of a 75,000 square foot facility on a 31-acre campus led by 30 faculty and staff members. The campus, located in Moultrie, Georgia, will welcome 55 Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine students to orientation on August 5 with classes starting on August 12.

More than three years in the planning and construction stages, PCOM South Georgia is the culmination of a mission to bring more physicians to the area.

Jay Feldstein, DO, president and CEO of Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine (PCOM) said, “We are very happy to be partnering in the region to bring our 120 years of experience in educating physicians and health sciences professionals to Southwest Georgia.”

He added, “PCOM South Georgia is a beautiful, state-of-the-art facility designed by faculty, staff and students. It’s a showpiece and we are all proud of what we’ve accomplished together with our partners. We are very pleased that Governor Kemp will help us dedicate South Georgia’s new medical school, a school designed to help meet physician workforce needs in rural Georgia.”

PCOM South Georgia is an additional location of PCOM and joins PCOM Georgia, located in Suwanee just north of Atlanta, as part of the healthcare workforce solution for the state.

Michael J. Sampson, DO, FAOASM, PCOM South Georgia’s chief academic officer, said, “We’ve designed PCOM South Georgia to be the region’s hometown medical school and we look forward to working with all of our partners to build Southwest Georgia’s physician workforce.”

He added, “We invite the South Georgia community to come to our ribbon cutting ceremony, tour our facility and meet our medical students. We are ready to educate the next generation of physicians for Southwest Georgia.”

The ribbon cutting ceremony will begin at 2 p.m. on the campus located at 2050 Tallokas Road in Moultrie. Refreshments and tours will follow the ceremony. A community open house will take place until 6 p.m.

Official actions to bring a campus to the Southwest Georgia region began in October of 2016 when a Memorandum of Agreement was signed which laid out a plan to begin the extensive accreditation process with the American Osteopathic Association (AOA) Commission on Osteopathic College Accreditation (COCA), the college’s accrediting agency.

"The impact this medical school will have on the South Georgia region is going to be monumental.  Our ability to reduce the physician shortage in rural areas and thereby meet the increasing healthcare needs of this population is going to improve," said Colquitt Regional President and CEO Jim Matney.  "I am just overwhelmingly proud of all of the stakeholders who have come together to make this possible and we are appreciative of PCOM for their willingness to step outside of the norm and place this campus in Southwest Georgia.”

Matney also serves as the chair of the South Georgia Medical Education and Research Consortium, a partnership of five independent healthcare systems in South Georgia. The consortium was established in an effort to address healthcare access and physician planning through the development of a medical education pipeline and graduate medical education programs.

Hospital members of the consortium include Archbold Medical Center, Thomasville; Colquitt Regional Medical Center, Moultrie; Phoebe Putney Health System, Albany; Tift Regional Health System, Tifton; and South Georgia Medical Center, Valdosta.

On Tuesday, June 25, 2019, evaluators from the AOA’s COCA visited the PCOM South Georgia campus, the final step in determining that all accreditation requirements are met to open the campus to students.