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Kohler to lead effort for UAMS branch in NW Arkansas Thursday, Apr 26, 2007 Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - A former Oregon university president will head efforts to open a satellite campus of Arkansas' only medical school in Northwest Arkansas, the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences announced Wednesday. Dr. Peter O. Kohler was named vice chancellor for the Northwest Arkansas Region of UAMS. He began work last week and his annual salary is $265.225, according to a UAMS spokeswoman. Kohler was president of the Oregon Health and Science University in Portland for 18 years before retiring last year. Before his work in Oregon, Kohler spent nine years at UAMS as chairman of the Department of Internal Medicine and as interim dean of the UAMS College of Medicine. In his new position, Kohler, 68, will plan for a satellite campus in Fayetteville that will include colleges of medicine, pharmacy and health-related professions, UAMS officials said. "I believe strongly in the need to expand the pipeline for producing more doctors, pharmacists and health care professionals," Kohler said. "Creating a satellite campus as a way to produce more health care professionals is an option being used across the country, including in Oregon. I am excited about the work ahead of us in turning this vision into a reality to benefit the people of Arkansas." UAMS chancellor I. Dodd Wilson said last year that the university began looking for a possible location for a satellite campus in Northwest Arkansas in 2005. Factors taken into consideration included population and numbers of hospital beds, patients and health care professionals. Wilson said the expansion was necessary because of anticipated shortages of health care professionals. He said Northwest Arkansas is growing faster than central Arkansas and predicted that if UAMS does not expand there, 15 years from now a different medical school could be located in the region, competing for students with UAMS. |
