Roseman University moves toward Nevada medi..

Higher education •University may later expand its training to South Jordan.

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Aspiring doctors in the Intermountain West may soon have another choice for medical school.

The board of trustees for the Roseman University of Health Sciences, which has campuses in Nevada and Utah, voted Friday to begin the process of opening a college of medicine in Henderson, Nev.

"We have physician shortages in pretty much every state in this area," said Jason Roth, the university's vice president of communications. "There is a need and it's a great opportunity for Roseman University."

Utah has the lowest rate of primary care physicians active in patient care in the country — 58.4 for every 100,000 people in 2010, according to the most recent data from Association of American Medical Colleges.

The university will study what facilities it needs, how much it could charge for tuition and how many students it would admit, among other issues, Roth said, before the board of trustees makes a final decision.

They are looking at fall 2015 as a possible opening date, with a possible later expansion to the private university's South Jordan campus. That would make it the second medical school in the state, joining the University of Utah, which has cut back on the number of students it admits in recent years.

The Roseman University of Health Sciences opened in 1999 as the Nevada College of Pharmacy and expanded to South Jordan in 2006. The nonprofit school now has colleges of nursing, dental medicine and an MBA program. It has 1,360 students; 559 of those are in Utah.

lwhitehurst@sltrib.com

Twitter: @lwhitehurst —

New medical schools — osteopathic and traditional — headed to Utah?

Roseman University moves toward Nevada medical school