Menno Smit

 

Just before the start of 2005 IFMSA-NL launched a new standing committee on Medical Education. This standing committee will increase the international perspective of medical education in the Netherlands.

The standing committee will focus on three main areas:

 

Global Health Education

As you may know, one of the main goals of IFMSA-NL is to offer future physicians a comprehensive introduction to global health issues and thereby develop culturally sensitive medical students. With the Medical Education workgroup, IFMSA-NL hopes to create a breeding ground for projects related to global health and medical education. Already quite a few local IFMSA-NL committees are organizing elective projects dealing with global health issues, such as infectious diseases, poverty, reproductive health, human rights, and global epidemics. Through exchange of information between the different local committees, IFMSA-NL hopes to improve the quality of electives even further and help more committees start global health electives. Furthermore, one of the tasks of the Medical Education workgroup will be to organise an annual IFMSA-NL congress on a global health theme. After two successful congresses in two years, the third congress will hopefully take place in December 2005. Besides focusing on extra-curricular activities, the Medical Education workgroup will also focus on getting more global health into the core-curriculum. Together with partner organisations, IFMSA-NL is lobbying with educators to teach more global health and is helping to create global health teaching material for direct implementation in curricula.

 

Mobility of Medical Students

Other than exposing Dutch medical students to global health issues in the safety of their own faculty, we further believe it is very important for medical students to travel abroad. Currently, IFMSA-NL strives to achieve this by offering students the opportunity to transcend national boundaries by participating in clinical, research or public health exchanges. However, we would also like to promote medical students to go abroad for a part of their study or specialization. Important resources for this are the international IFMSA Curriculum and Residency Databases, which create a complete overview of all the opportunities to study and specialize abroad. The Medical Education workgroup will continuously update the Dutch section; thereby attracting students to come to the Netherlands. Another important factor in going abroad is the creation of the European Higher Education Area, the so-called Bologna Process (Ba/Ma, ECTS, etc). It is important for students to ensure its proper implementation as certain aspects may be difficult to apply to medicine. IFMSA-NL strives for collaboration between the Dutch and European departments on this matter. Furthermore, the Medical Education workgroup would also like to try to increase the number of medical students going abroad with programs such as Erasmus.

 

Quality of Medical Education

Internationally, there are many students active in the Medical Education workgroup who are also active in decision-making bodies. IFMSA-NL hopes to contribute to the quality of medical education in the Netherlands and abroad by offering the Dutch medical students who are also members of the decision-making bodies, the opportunity to work together with their colleagues overseas. IFMSA-NL and the Studentbestuursleden Overleg Geneeskunde are already working together on this process. The workgroup further hopes to participate in the international Book Aid project, collecting medical text books for medical students in developing countries. Stay tuned for more information! As you can see, many things are being done in order to increase the international perspective of medical education in the Netherlands, and there is much more to come! If you have any questions or would like to help out, don't hesitate to contact us! For more information on the Medical Education Workgroup visit our website: www.ifmsa.nl, go to

'Werkgroepen', and then click on 'Medisch Onderwijs'.