Jarrod Shapiro, DPM
Practice Perfect Editor
Assistant Professor,
Dept. of Podiatric Medicine,
Surgery & Biomechanics
College of Podiatric Medicine
Western University of Health Sciences,
St, Pomona, CA

The Dual Degree in Podiatry:
Survey Results and Commentary

As promised, I'm presenting the results of our short survey regarding the dual MD/DPM degree concept, as presented in Practice Perfect 221. In the first part of our discussion, I’ll provide a short analysis and then add my two cents on the dual degree controversy. Let me again state my disclaimer. Though I am a Western University of Health Sciences CPM professor, I am not an expert in education, and my opinions do not reflect those of the College of Podiatric Medicine.

Survey Says

Let’s get to the results. To those of you who participated, thank you very much. The larger the number, the more valid our results are. We had 117 participants in our survey which is a very small subset of the podiatric community (approximately 15,000 podiatrists nation-wide), so these results are not valid to extrapolate to our entire community. Of the five questions we asked, we had a strong response. Here's a graphical breakdown of your responses to the first question:

1. Should podiatric medical schools offer a dual MD/DPM or DO/DPM degree?

Follow this link, or click the image above, to view the breakdown of all the survey responses.

I was surprised to find that when asked the question Should podiatric medical schools offer a dual MD/DPM or DO/DPM degree, about twice as many participants said yes as responded no (72 yes to 35 no). I think this opinion is explained by the strong response to the second and third questions: I think obtaining a dual MD/DPM degree will make podiatry more competitive and Obtaining a dual MD/DPM degree would increase the respect given to podiatrists by the medical community. I sense from this robust response (77% and 81% respectively) that our participants feel the dual degree will make our profession more competitive through true equality by acquiring the actual MD degree (rather than equivalence).

I was also surprised to find that responses were 2 to 1 agreeing that students who obtain a dual degree will remain in podiatry. I’ll explain my surprise shortly. I was not surprised to see the almost 50/50 split in responses to our final question: If podiatric medical schools offered the addition of an MD to my current DPM degree, I would return to school for 1-2 years to obtain this degree. As a podiatrist in practice for a few years, I can imagine a return to school to obtain an MD or DO degree would be prohibitively challenging for many reasons (cost, inconvenience, time donation away from family, etc.). Wanting a degree and returning to school to obtain that degree are two entirely different things!

Tonight's Premier Lecture is
The Science and Clinical Application
of Bi-layered Living Cell Therapy
presented by John Steinberg, DPM

Shapiro’s Opinion

So, here are my thoughts on the subject. Why add my opinions? Well, I’m the one writing this blog, and I’m a podiatrist, so I have just as much at stake as everyone else. Otherwise, this is just another opinion – take it or leave it. For those of you who haven’t weighed in yet, please write in to the eTalk and participate. We all want to hear your opinions.

First, I was surprised by the results thus far. I was expecting a strong reaction against the dual MD/DPM degree, but when I thought over the responses to questions two and three, I could understand the thought process. Understandably, we want to be more respected and more competitive. As such, one way to obtaining these goals would be to attain the same degree.

I was more surprised to read how many respondents thought podiatry students would stay with podiatry once they obtained their dual degree. Although I completely disagree with this, I can understand it. Most podiatrists I’ve spoken with over the years are very happy in their position and would not want to change. This is my opinion as well. However, new students obtaining this hypothetical dual degree have not yet practiced podiatry, so may not understand its benefits.

This is a good segue into my argument, because I don’t think a dual MD/DPM degree is a good idea for our specialty. I’m 100% in favor of other dual degrees (PhD, MS, MBA, etc.). In fact, more of us should obtain dual degrees, especially those who complete extra training such as fellowships. We need experts in public health, research, and business, among others, to move us forward.

In the current market, a podiatry student who obtains an MD/DPM is, in my opinion, unlikely to pursue podiatry as a career. In this situation, the mixed degree becomes a backdoor method to obtain an MD degree. I know; it sounds harsh. What does Shapiro have against podiatry you ask? Why do I think this? Because when I go to marketing events where I speak to college students, they’re not interested in podiatry. They’re interested in allopathic or osteopathic medicine. Additionally, of the podiatric medical school applications I review for Western University, a significant proportion of them have already applied to MD or DO programs and have been denied entry. Clearly, students prefer the other programs. Provide these same students with a dual degree option, a residency shortage, and our profession’s perception of lack of full respect, and they’ll clearly head to the MD route. I don’t mean to sound insulting to anyone. I love my profession and wouldn’t choose otherwise. However, that’s the reality.

“But what about the oral and maxillary surgeons?” you ask. “These doctors who obtain a dual DDS/MD degree stay with their original dental specialty,” you argue. Yes, that’s very true, but I think that argues more for my point of view for one very simple reason: money. Dentists make a lot of money, especially in comparison with the rest of medicine, and it’s this one driving force that makes dentistry so desired. The oral surgeons have a dual degree for the one simple reason that they want to be able to admit patients. They don’t want to be MDs because they know if they practice internal medicine, family practice, or a number of other medical fields they’ll make less money. For those of you who disagree, I’d ask one question: how many applicants to podiatric medical school would there be if podiatrists made more money than MDs and DOs? I’ll bet any amount of money we would have an avalanche of applicants.

To round off our discussion, I’ll take next week to offer some thoughts on podiatric parity. In the mean time, I invite all readers to post your opinions and to answer this question: what should we do to bring podiatry into the forefront of medical specialties? Is it more money? Is it an MD/DPM degree? What do you think?