The UW School of Medicine and Public Health is ending its long-standing program that trains medical lab technologists, in cuts required by Gov. Jim Doyle’s proposed budget, university officials said Tuesday.

The Clinical Laboratory Sciences program will train existing students until they finish the four-year undergraduate curriculum but will no longer enroll new students, said Dr. Robert Golden, medical school dean. The program, which started in 1925, has about 80 students.

To close a state budget gap of about $5 billion, Doyle has called for trimming $174 million at the University of Wisconsin System, including $63 million at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, from the state’s $2.3 billion in support for the system’s projected budget over two years, said System spokesman David Giroux.

Golden said the medical school targeted the lab tech program for savings because other System campuses offer the same four-year programs.

The lab tech programs at UW-Milwaukee and UW-Stevens Point, like the one at UW-Madison, are accredited by the National Accrediting Agency for Clinical Laboratory Sciences. The other programs are at UW-La Crosse and UW-Oshkosh, according to medical school spokeswoman Dian Land.

Madison Area Technical College has a two-year program.

The medical school’s move will trim $560,000 a year from the medical school’s budget of about $502 million, said spokeswoman Lisa Brunette. None of the four faculty involved will be laid off until at least 2010, Land said.

Doyle’s office has told the medical school to cut its budget by 10 percent, Land said.

"This difficult but necessary decision is a reflection of the dire economic realities confronting public institutions," Golden said in a statement. He added: "Several painful across the board cuts will be put in place (at the medical school)."

Lab techs, who run tests to monitor health and diagnose or treat diseases, work at hospitals, research centers, blood banks, biotech companies, crime labs and other places.

Starting salaries for graduates of four-year programs are about $45,000 to $50,000 a year, said Sue Beglinger, director of MATC’s program. Starting salaries for graduates of two-year programs are about $38,000 to $42,000, Beglinger said.

Graduates of both kinds of programs are in great demand, with two to three jobs available for each graduate, she said.

"They are a hot commodity," she said. "I have real concerns every time a program closes."

MATC’s program, which has 24 students, could double in size within two years if necessary, Beglinger said.

Wisconsin has nine four-year programs and seven two-year programs that are accredited to train lab techs, according to the accrediting agency.