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Internationalisation of Chinese medical schools

2013; Elsevier BV; Volume: 381; Issue: 9882 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/s0140-6736(13)61199-x

1474-547X

Angela Fan, Russell O Kosik, Qi Chen,

Empathy and Medical Education

There are 1193 institutions of higher education in China certified by the Ministry, including those in Hong Kong and Macao: 31 are medical schools teaching traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), and 152 are medical schools teaching western medicine—52 offer an English Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) degree, equivalent to the American Medical Degree. 30·9% of western medicine medical schools and 63·5% of MBBS medical schools enrol international students, 36·2% and 65·4% of western medicine medical schools and MBBS medical schools offer courses on international and global health. 23·0% of western medicine medical schools and 46·2% of MBBS medical schools employ international experts. The geographical distribution of western medicine medical schools in China matches with population and financial resource distribution, with east China having the greatest number of western medicine medical schools. Despite a large wealth gap between regions, east China and south-central China have a similar number of western medicine medical schools (44 vs 41). However, east China has 20 MBBS medical schools, whereas south-central China has 12. The number of TCM medical schools is similar between the two regions. More than a quarter of TCM medical schools enrol international students, and more TCM medical schools have international student exchange programmes and scholarships than do western medicine medical schools. Many Chinese people rely on TCM for their medical care, and there is a high demand from Chinese students to learn TCM. In the past 20 years, TCM has been largely exported: acupuncture clinics and herbalists have opened in Europe and the USA. Just like a generation of Chinese doctors travelled to learn western medicine, a new generation of international students is going to China to learn TCM. With students and faculty exchanges, global health courses, and interaction with international affiliates, Chinese medical institutions have taken an important first step towards the internationalisation of their education system. Such trends affect the global nature of medical curricula and the medicine discipline itself. Medical training is no longer culturally distinct. Programmes in Chinese medical universities support student and doctor exchanges, but more importantly, they promote idea exchanges between different cultures, leading to a harmonisation between eastern and western perspectives on medicine. We declare that we have no conflicts of interest. Effects of body size and hypertension treatments on cardiovascular event rates: subanalysis of the ACCOMPLISH randomised controlled trialHypertension in normal weight and obese patients might be mediated by different mechanisms. Thiazide-based treatment gives less cardiovascular protection in normal weight than obese patients, but amlodipine-based therapy is equally effective across BMI subgroups and thus offers superior cardiovascular protection in non-obese hypertension. Full-Text PDF