UH Med Now

By Paula Bender, JABSOM Media & Communications

U.S. News & World Report has published its Best Medical School lists, and the John A. Burns School of Medicine’s Primary Care and Research areas found itself in good company.

Happy MD 2023 students take a selfie.

In the Primary Care category, JABSOM shared its rank, #56, with Case Western University of Ohio. JABSOM was followed by four institutions that were at #58: Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai of New York, Saint Louis University of Missouri, the University of Illinois, and West Virginia University.

In the Research category, JABSOM was ranked at #62 with the University of Arizona – Tucson, the University of Kansas Medical Center, and the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

“Each year the school monitors its national ranking via the USNWR,” said JABSOM Dean Jerris Hedges, MD. “Given that much of the ranking methodology is based upon size of the medical school (e.g., number of students, number of faculty, etc), and national name recognition among deans of other schools, it is surprising that our small, more remotely located school consistently ranks as highly as it does each year.”

According to the Dean, more important metrics for the people of Hawaiʻi are those tracked by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), which show more details that reflect the humanity of JABSOM’s mission, as cited here.

• JABSOM has led the nation the past five years in producing Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander physicians
• JABSOM has a larger proportion of faculty who are women than 91% of other medical schools 
• More JABSOM graduates are practicing primary care 10 years following graduation (the time it takes for full training and licensing to practice) than occurs at 75% of other medical schools (with more graduates choosing a primary care field in last three years than 84% of other medical schools)
• More JABSOM graduates are practicing in-state 10 years following graduation than occurs at 55% of medical schools 
• JABSOM medical graduates considered themselves better trained to care for people of different backgrounds than graduates at 99% of medical schools 
• JABSOM medical graduates considered themselves better prepared to care for the underserved than graduates at 89% of medical schools, and
• JABSOM led the nation in preparing students to address health disparities in their communities