[ad_1]
November 14, 2025
3 min read
Key takeaways:
- There are now 207,158 DOs and osteopathic medicine students.
- Almost 70% of actively practicing DOs are younger than age 45 years.
The osteopathic medicine profession passed 200,000 physicians and medical students for the first time in the field’s over 150-year history, the American Osteopathic Association announced.
The milestone “is a powerful testament to the growing trust patients have in our whole-person approach to care,” American Osteopathic Association (AOA) President Robert G.G. Piccinini, DO, D.FACN, said in a press release. “Our profession continues to evolve while staying true to the values that define osteopathic medicine — empathy, connection and quality patient care.”
According to this year’s Osteopathic Medical Profession Report, 207,158 DOs and osteopathic medical students currently make up the profession. And across the U.S., around 40,000 students are enrolled in 44 osteopathic medicine colleges across 71 campuses.
Healio spoke with Piccinini to discuss what factors contributed to the growth, what stood out to him among the findings and more.
Healio: What are some possible driving factors behind the growth in osteopathic physicians and students?
Piccinini: Outside the physical growth of the schools, osteopathic medicine is hitting its stride in its concepts of whole-person care — that the body, structure and function are all interrelated — and our ability to focus on not just disease but more on what’s behind the patient and what things bring the patient to their whole life cycle, like nutrition and social determinants of health. All those things are becoming more in favor, talked about and important. We’ve been doing it since our foundations of who we are.
Healio: Were any findings in the report surprising or particularly noteworthy to you?
Piccinini: One was that we’re over 207,000 osteopathic medical students and osteopathic physicians and another is that 25% of all graduating medical students now are DOs. But then there were a couple of things that really brought smiles to me, one of which was that 38% of military physicians are osteopathic physicians.
What is really surprising is that nearly 70% of actively practicing DOs are under the age of 45 years. To me, that just shows that although we’ve been around for over 100 years, we are still a very young, vibrant and energized branch of medicine.
Healio: What do these trends mean for the health care workforce shortage?
Piccinini: It means that we are here to fill the gaps. The majority of what osteopathic medicine physicians go into is primary care. Although we have specialists in every field that’s out there, our majority is primary care. That’s the hometown physician. That’s the person who is going to be with you for 20 or 30 years.
In my career now, I have some patients who I’ve had for 25 years. For me, when I look at this young group, they’re going to be able to have patients and their patients’ kids as patients, and maybe their patients’ grandkids as patients. To me, they’re going to be able to fill the gap because they’re going to be in the community for a long time and that is the exciting thing.
Healio: What advice would you give to a medical student who was deciding between becoming an MD or a DO?
Piccinini: My advice is that I can look back in my career, and I am so grateful for what osteopathic medicine has given me. It has given me an ability to touch people’s lives in ways I could never imagine. I have been with them at the high points of their lives and at the very lowest point of their lives, and I’ve been able to walk with them throughout the whole process. And osteopathic medicine allows me not just to look at diseases but look at the whole person. To me, that is a shining example of what a true physician should be.
Healio: Anything else to add?
Piccinini: We are also at the highest level of the government. The last three presidential cycles have had osteopathic physicians as their physician to the President. The chief physician of NASA is an osteopathic physician. The Surgeon General of the Army is an osteopathic physician. We’re just starting to come into our stride, and there is nothing holding us back.
For more information:
Robert G.G. Piccinini, DO, D.FACN, can be reached through Ernst Lamothe, AOA public relations, media relations and social media director, at elamothe@osteopathic.org.
Sources/Disclosures
Source:
Healio Interviews
Reference:
Disclosures:
Healio could not determine Piccinini’s relevant financial disclosures at the time of publication.
Ask a clinical question and tap into Healio AI’s knowledge base.
- PubMed, enrolling/recruiting trials, guidelines
- Clinical Guidance, Healio CME, FDA news
- Healio’s exclusive daily news coverage of clinical data
[ad_2]
Source link
