POCATELLO (Idaho Ed News) — Idaho State University has hired a national consulting firm to study, and price out, the possible purchase of a for-profit medical school based in Meridian.

As political leaders wrestle with the state’s chronic physicians’ shortage, Idaho State has been looking at acquiring the Idaho College of Osteopathic Medicine for months. But the $100,000 consulting project doesn’t mean Idaho State is on the verge of making a bid, university President Robert Wagner said.

“We are still in the initial exploration phase,” Wagner told Idaho Education News in an interview.

But consultants are on a fast track — and they say they are looking at “the need for a state-owned medical school in Idaho.”

Consultants are getting an independent third-party analysis of ICOM’s fair-marke

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