University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center

Southwestern Medical College as it appeared at its founding in the 1940s. Animal facilities are seen in the lower right.

Under the leadership of Dr. Edward H. Cary and Karl Hoblitzelle, a group of Dallas citizens organized Southwestern Medical Foundation in 1939 to promote medical education and research in Dallas and the region. When Baylor University moved its school of medicine from Dallas to Houston in 1943, the foundation formally established Southwestern Medical College as the 68th medical school in the United States. Founded during World War II, the medical school was initially housed in a handful of abandoned barracks.

When a new state medical school was proposed after World War II, leaders of Southwestern Medical Foundation offered the college's equipment, library, and certain restricted funds to the University of Texas System, provided the university would locate its new medical branch in Dallas. The Board of Regents accepted this offer, and in 1949 the college became Southwestern Medical School of The University of Texas. In 1954 the name was changed to The University of Texas Southwestern Medical School. The present campus site on Harry Hines Boulevard was occupied in 1955 upon the completion of the Edward H. Cary Building. This placed the medical school faculty next to the then-newly built Parkland Memorial Hospital.

In November 1972 the name and scope of the medical school were changed with its reorganization into The University of Texas Health Science Center at Dallas. This provided for coordinated but separate medical, graduate, and undergraduate components.

In 1986 the Howard Hughes Medical Institute opened a research facility on the campus. Its investigators also hold faculty positions in the basic science departments of the Medical School and Graduate School.

In October 1987 the UT System Board of Regents approved changing the name of the health science center to The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. The Center consists of three degree-granting institutions: UT Southwestern Medical School, UT Southwestern Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, and UT Southwestern School of Health Professions.

The northern and western campuses are where most of the recent expansion has taken place

Since the late 1960s the university has added more than 6 million square feet of new construction. The 60-acre South Campus includes 20 buildings housing classrooms, laboratories, offices, the extensive University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center Library, an auditorium, and a large outpatient center. Affiliated hospitals adjacent to the campus are Zale Lipshy Pavilion, Parkland Memorial Hospital, William P. Clements Jr. University Hospital, and Children's Medical Center (Dallas).

In 1987 the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation gave the university 30 acres (120,000 m²) near the South Campus for future expansion. A 20-year master plan for the site, called North Campus, called for six research towers, a support-services building, an energy plant, and underground parking, in addition to the Mary Nell and Ralph B. Rogers Magnetic Resonance Center and the Moncrief Radiation Oncology Center. Three research towers and an elevated campus connector, linking the South Campus with the North Campus, were completed in the 1990s. A fourth 14-story research tower was completed in 2005, followed by a 12-story research tower in 2011. In 1999 the university purchased an additional 50 acres from the MacArthur Foundation, and a portion was used to create an on-campus student-housing complex of 156 apartments. A second phase of 126 units opened in 2004. In 2008, the university purchased the 24-acre Exchange Park adjacent to the North Campus.

In 2008, UT Southwestern announced plans to open the BioCenter at Southwestern Medical District, a facility to commercialize university technologies and attract biotech companies to the area.[5]

Also in 2008, UT Southwestern acquired the Exchange Park site and renamed it the Paul M. Bass Administrative and Clinical Center on the North Campus. The center was named in honor of Mr. Bass, chairman emeritus of the Southwestern Medical Foundation, who served in that role until 2008. With this property, the campus grew to 9 million square feet of laboratory, clinical, educational, and administrative space, covering 387 acres.

In 2009, the $186 million Biomedical Research Building (NL Building on the North Campus) opened. The building is the largest LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) silver-certified laboratory space in Texas.

UT Southwestern opened its William P. Clements Jr. University Hospital on Dec. 6, 2014, along with the decommissioning of the 50-year-old St. Paul University Hospital.[6]

UTSW opened its Radiation Oncology center in 2017.[7]

UT Southwestern admits approximately 230 students each year. The average MCAT score is 515, and undergraduate GPA in 2017 was 3.81. The acceptance rate for 2014 was 5.6%.

UTSW is one of the five least-expensive public medical schools and among the top 10 largest medical schools in the United States. The school's tuition and fees are approximately $20,000 per year for in-state residents, being subsidized by the state. Admission is competitive and, by mandate of the state legislature, 90 percent of applicants admitted are from the state of Texas. Many out-of-state students earn competitive scholarships that make up the difference.

The Medical School's curriculum emphasizes clinical experience and electives from the first year on. The curriculum comprises three periods – Pre-Clerkship, Clerkship, and Post-Clerkship – and focuses on providing a foundation in biomedical sciences, training in clinical care, and opportunities for research.

The Medical School features six Academic Colleges that function as small learning communities, each headed by a faculty mentor.

Many students use their free time to participate in a variety of community service activities, such as United to Serve, an annual health and fun fair hosted by UT Southwestern for the surrounding community, and the weekly Monday Clinic (one of six clinics), organized by student volunteers and staffed by UT Southwestern physicians, providing free medical care to underserved Dallas communities. Other service opportunities include participating at Camp Sweeney, a summer camp in North Texas for children with diabetes.

Along with the M.D. degree, UT Southwestern offers options for students to pursue combined degrees and to earn special graduation distinctions. The combined degrees include:

• M.D./Ph.D. – Called the Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP), this is one of fewer than 50 M.D./Ph.D.-granting programs nationwide that receive financial support from the National Institutes of Health. It combines dissertation work in an area of biomedical science, leading to the Ph.D., along with clinical studies, leading to the M.D.
• M.D./M.B.A. – This five-year program in conjunction with UT Dallas focuses on giving future physicians the skills for integrating medicine and business.
• M.D./M.P.H. – UT Southwestern and UTHealth School of Public Health in Houston offer students a degree in each field at the end of their four-year M.D. program.
• M.D./M.S. in Clinical Science – This program combines didactic training with a mentored clinical research project. The program concludes with submission and defense of a master's thesis.

UT Southwestern is ranked 25th in Research and 8th in Primary Care according to the 2017 U.S. News & World Report Medical School rankings.

The McDermott Administrative building was a campus icon for many years

With an enrollment of more than 1,000 students (467 predoctoral and 564 postdoctoral), the Graduate School educates biomedical scientists, engineers, clinical researchers, and counselors. Programs lead to Doctor of Philosophy and Master of Science degrees and, in some cases, non-degree certificates.

The Graduate School has 12 Ph.D. programs: Biological Chemistry; Biomedical Engineering; Cancer Biology; Cell and Molecular Biology; Clinical Psychology; Genetics, Development, and Disease; Immunology; Integrative Biology; Molecular Biophysics; Molecular Microbiology; Neuroscience; and Organic Chemistry.

In addition, a master's degree and a certificate are offered in Clinical Science. Postdoctoral certificates are offered in Research, Advanced Research, Cancer, Educational Techniques, Obesity and Metabolism, and Scientific Management.

UT Southwestern runs a Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) offering a combined M.D./Ph.D. degree. It is one of fewer than 50 M.D./Ph.D.-granting programs nationwide that receive financial support from the National Institutes of Health. The largest source of private support for UTSW's program has been from H. Ross Perot.^[10]

The clinical training curriculum includes coursework in the disciplines necessary to understand human disease at the level of cellular physiology and biochemistry. In addition, students practice clinical skills at UT Southwestern's affiliated clinical training hospitals, including Parkland Memorial Hospital and William P. Clements Jr. University Hospital.

Following summer laboratory rotations, students choose one of 10 interdepartmental graduate programs and select a dissertation mentor from the UT Southwestern Graduate School faculty for training in intellectual and experimental strategies. During these years, the MSTP student functions as a graduate student in his or her laboratory while maintaining an awareness of clinical medicine through program activities.

Dissertation research culminates in results that significantly advance the state of biomedical knowledge.

About 340 students are enrolled in UT Southwestern's School of Health Professions. The school confers a doctoral professional degree in Physical Therapy and master's degrees in Clinical Nutrition, Physician Assistant Studies, Prosthetics-Orthotics, and Rehabilitation Counseling. The school also has a baccalaureate certificate program in Radiation Therapy.

The Physician Assistant program was founded in 1972. For the past five years, graduates have had a 100 percent first-time pass rate on the national certifying exam. Much of the training occurs at Parkland Hospital.^[11]

Seven UT Southwestern alumni or faculty members have been awarded Nobel Prizes:

• In 1985, Michael Stuart Brown and Joseph L. Goldstein shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their discovery of the basic mechanism of cholesterol metabolism. Goldstein is Chairman of Molecular Genetics at UT Southwestern, and Brown directs the Erik Jonsson Center for Research in Molecular Genetics and Human Disease.
• Johann Deisenhofer, Professor of Biochemistry and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator at UT Southwestern, shared the 1988 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for using X-ray crystallography to describe the structure of a protein involved in photosynthesis.
• Alfred G. Gilman shared the 1994 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery of G proteins and the role they play in the complex processes by which cells communicate with each other. Gilman, a Regental Professor Emeritus who died in December 2015, was Dean of UT Southwestern Medical School.
• Bruce Beutler, Director of the Center for the Genetics of Host Defense, shared the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with two other scientists for their immune system investigations. Dr. Beutler was honored for the discovery of receptor proteins that recognize disease-causing agents and activate innate immunity.
• Thomas C. Südhof, Adjunct Professor of Neuroscience and former Chair of the department at UT Southwestern, shared the 2013 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with two other scientists for discoveries about cellular transport systems. Südhof, now at Stanford University School of Medicine, was recognized for his pioneering work at UT Southwestern on synaptic transmission,.^[14]
• Linda B. Buck received the 2004 award in Medicine jointly with Richard Axel for their work on olfactory receptors. She completed her doctorate at UT Southwestern and is currently a Full Member of the Basic Sciences Division at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and an Affiliate Professor of Physiology and Biophysics at the University of Washington.

Parkland Memorial Hospital

• Jim C. Barnett (M.D. 1949) (deceased 2013), Member of the Mississippi House of Representatives from 1992 to 2008.^[16]
• Linda B. Buck, (Ph.D. 1980) 2004 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine for work on olfactory receptors, currently an HHMI investigator at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
• Robert Cade, (M.D. 1954) (deceased 2007) professor of medicine and nephrology at the University of Florida, formulated Gatorade.
• Daniel W. Foster, (M.D. 1955) (deceased 2018) UTSW chairman department of medicine, holder of the UTSW John Denis McGarry, Ph.D., Distinguished Chair in Diabetes and Metabolic Research
• Brett Giroir, (M.D. 1986), 16th United States Assistant Secretary for Health and admiral in the United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.
• Joseph L. Goldstein, (M.D. 1966) currently Chairman of the Department of Molecular Genetics at UTSW.
• Malcolm Perry, (M.D. 1955) (deceased 2009) while a surgery resident attended to John F. Kennedy at Parkland Memorial Hospital on November 22, 1963, chief of vascular surgery New York-Cornell Hospital 1978 to 1988, professor of surgery Texas Tech University, professor emeritus UTSW.
• Stuart Spitzer (M.D. 1971?), incoming Republican member of the Texas House of Representatives from District 4
• Richard Warshak, (Ph.D. 1978) clinical and research psychologist; expert in divorce, child custody, and parental alienation; served as a White House consultant on family law reform;
• Xiaodong Wang (Ph.D.), biomedical researcher, member of the National Academy of Science 2004, Shaw Prize in Life Science and Medicine 2006, Director National Institute of Biological Sciences, Beijing
• Kern Wildenthal (M.D. 1964) president of the Children's Medical Center Foundation in Dallas, President Emeritus and Professor of Medicine Emeritus UTSW, president UTSW 1986-2008.