This is an interesting phenomena.

Ashley A. Smith writes for Inside Higher Ed:

Pipeline for Hispanic Doctors

There’s a crisis underway in American hospitals and clinics — the country faces a massive shortage of physicians as the population increases and grows older.

That crisis exists while the Hispanic and Latino population continues to grow, yet the number of Hispanic doctors declines.

In order to try to fix these problems, Ponce Health Sciences University in Puerto Rico and University Ventures announced today that they are partnering to train more bilingual and bicultural physicians. The goal of the partnership is to increase the number of graduates from the Ponce program who move on to medical residency programs. Ponce is the first and only for-profit medical school in the U.S. with Liaison Committee on Medical Education accreditation. LCME is affiliated with the American Medical Association.

The partnership will seek to put more technology in the hands of students, like iPads to help deliver curriculum and assessments, and to create research labs to help with cancer treatment studies.
“The end goal is to increase the number of Hispanic physicians in the U.S. We know it’s needed and we’re almost trying to stop the loss more than anything,” said David Lenihan, president of Ponce Health Sciences University.

Lenihan said doctors benefit from having familiarity with Hispanic cultural characteristics that often play a part in their interaction with patients.