PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (AP) – A Caribbean medical school started by an American man has come under investigation by the government of St Kitts and Nevis after officials voiced concerns about the school founder’s credentials, a newspaper reported Monday.

Officials in the Caribbean nation are looking into Thomas M Uhrin’s professional training and credentials, health minister Rupert Herbert told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, adding that “We want reputable schools”.

While Uhrin, a Pennsylvania native, has portrayed himself as a doctor at St Theresa’s Medical University in St Kitts and Nevis, he does not have a medical license, has not completed medical training and does not hold a PhD, the newspaper reported.

Uhrin, the school’s chancellor and executive dean, did not respond to repeated interview requests by the paper. The Associated Press could not locate a home phone number for him.

But Vernon S Veira, an attorney in St Kitts and the school’s chairman, said Uhrin is qualified.

“We have investigated Dr Uhrin and found that he has not acted inappropriately at all,” Veira said.

The St Kitts ministry of education’s accreditation board has launched its own investigation into Uhrin’s background, said Shawna Lake, the board’s head.

While she declined to specify what prompted the initial investigation, Lake said that the dean of a medical school “is not necessarily required” to be a practicing physician, but must have acceptable background experience in medicine and doctorate in a related field.

“He had official-looking, notarised documents that were provided to us,” Lake said. “(But) if information is brought to our attention that (a school) is not legitimate, there is no hesitation in pulling the cord.”

The issue is a sensitive one for officials since Caribbean medical schools are routinely viewed as inferior to their US counterparts and that much of the student body is comprised of aspiring doctors who were not accepted at American medical schools.

The investigation is not the first time that Uhrin’s credentials have been called into question. In 1999, he resigned as medical director of a Pittsburgh-area clinic after the newspaper found he had not completed medical training.

He was also terminated in September 2004 from the International University of the Health Sciences in St Kitts after it was revealed that he lied about earning a doctorate and other matters, said R J Simms, vice-president of administration and finance for the school, which provides the bulk of its instruction online.

“You always have a target on your back when you are a Caribbean medical school. We’re working to improve things. Tom Uhrin isn’t someone we wanted to be in charge of a medical school,” Simms said.

St Theresa’s is more than 2,400 miles away from its headquarters in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, where Uhrin’s employees field phone calls, collect mail from a post office box and handle admissions applications, financial information, advising and faculty hiring, according to its Web site, staff and students.

Students pay tuition of $6,500 (euro4,935) per 15-week semester for basic medical sciences courses and $8,500 (euro6,454) per 12-week semester for clinical sciences, according to the school’s Web site. About a dozen students attended classes last semester.