This month, the Texas International Education Consortium (TIEC) reflects on a project that has been a first in our long history: a comprehensive set of recommendations for a new teaching hospital and a future medical school abroad. With the final approval of the deliverables for Prince Mohammad Bin Fahd University (PMU) Health, TIEC will celebrate this first for us to serve as a project manager for the initial planning stages of a health system. Yet the PMU Health collaboration is a natural progression of what has made TIEC an enduring ally for sharing Texas’s strengths with partners around the world for almost four decades.
Texas is home to some of the most advanced medical research, healthcare systems, and industry-leading hospitals in the country and the world. Among TIEC’s Texas member institutions, we are proud to represent health science centers and universities with leading medical schools. At the helm of one such institution is Dr. Rick Lange, President of Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso (TTUHSC El Paso).
Dr. Lange is a cardiologist by training and no stranger to international collaborations even before he came to Texas. His passion for sharing his own knowledge to help build new institutions made him eager to join the PMU Health project.
“I think it's a wonderful way to connect. There are interests, expertise, and experience here in Texas that can be – and probably need to be – shared with other places and institutions, not only within the U.S. but internationally,” Dr. Lange explained. He said that Texas was a logical fit for a PMU when it was ready to find a set of advisors or guides to build a new, world-class hospital in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA).
“If a country or an institution overseas is looking for expertise in a variety of areas, you don't have to go very far. It's all here [in Texas] among the various healthcare institutions, general academic institutions, universities — it's all here. And many of my [fellow steering committee members] and I have been in Texas for a long time and know how to draw upon expertise around the state.”
BUILDING A NETWORK OF TEXAS HEALTHCARE EXPERTS READY FOR INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATION
When PMU approached TIEC in 2022 with the opportunity to be among a handful of organizations under consideration to help establish a world-class teaching hospital in the Eastern Province of KSA, the history and relationship between PMU and TIEC was already strong. TIEC served as an advisor to help establish the university as one of the first Western-style universities in KSA in 2006. The close relationship had continued for nearly two decades, with PMU having become TIEC’s first official affiliate member earlier that year.
TIEC wraps up the initial phase of our work as the project manager for the planning stages of the teaching hospital and health system at the end of November. When asked to sum up the collaboration in a few words, Lauren Bedsole, TIEC’s project director for the PMU Health project, answers with a laugh: “Comprehensive!”
Bedsole explained that TIEC’s recommendations span every aspect of establishing a new hospital: from the physical building itself, to the staffing needs, to policies for quality and patient safety. Divided into six working groups, the initial planning covers recommendations for clinical specialties, hospital equipment and procurement, information technology, organizational design and human resources, architectural design, as well as quality, safety, and accreditation. Chairs from each of the working groups, along with the three hospital model advisory board members, make up the project’s steering committee. More than 30 academic and industry experts from Texas and beyond have contributed to TIEC’s final recommendations, laying the solid groundwork for PMU Health.
The goal of the PMU Health project is to build a teaching hospital that will serve the local community, delivering preventative care through the main hospital and new outpatient care centers in the Al Khobar region. The teaching hospital will also offer PMU’s future medical students a facility where they can train close to home, serving the population in their immediate vicinity and in a facility that is designed to serve their learning needs.
Over time, PMU Health aims to become an international destination for individuals from around the region and will establish three hospital-based Centers of Excellence in cardiology, diabetes care, and neurology. Dr. Lange's own experience in cardiology and knowledge of working toward accreditation for a new teaching facility first attracted him to the project.
“I was able to add expertise in a couple of areas. One is as the dean of a new medical school and as the president of a new institution, I was able to bring those experiences together … I'm a cardiologist as well and have continued to practice, but I also set up a cardiology program in Trinidad, a teaching program when I was still at Johns Hopkins. The ability to bring administrative expertise from my current role and my role as a cardiologist seemed to fit in well with the group [of Texas experts],” explained Dr. Lange.
For TIEC, Bedsole described the project as an inspiring proof of concept: a new network of healthcare experts across the state of Texas, as well as a few located further afield, who are ready to share their knowledge and experience with new collaborators on the international stage.
“We are proud of the relationships the project has led us to forge here in Texas and beyond. Equally, it has allowed us to further strengthen our ties with our longtime partners at PMU,” said Bedsole. “We are delighted to be at a place where we can confidently encourage more of our Texas healthcare leaders to be a part of the next collaboration.”
MAKING A CASE FOR PRIORITIZING SHARING EXPERTISE ABROAD
Dr. Lange’s work on this project inspired him to become the newest member of the TIEC board of directors. With this involvement, he intends to make a case for more Texas higher education leaders prioritizing this type of international collaboration. His main role overseeing growth at home with the expansion of TTUHSC El Paso’s own specialties keeps him plenty busy, but international collaborations like the PMU Health project bring unique opportunities, he expounded.
“I think it's a wonderful way to connect. Being able to share your expertise [overseas] and with colleagues around the state and to work together to set up what we hope will be a world-class hospital and a world-class educational effort makes it a priority for me,” explained Dr. Lange. As PMU Health continues to grow, he hopes to see the relationships with TIEC and its Texas institutions continue.
“Cutting the ribbon is really not the end of the project, but the culmination and the initiation of the next phase [of collaboration],” Dr. Lange said. “TIEC's greatest benefit is to help connect that expertise and those desires here in Texas with opportunities that might exist overseas. I hope TIEC [continues] to blossom. TIEC really is a clearinghouse for sharing what we do well in Texas with other places around the country and the world.”
