Socially responsible medical education: innovations and challenges in a minority setting

Abstract

Medical Education 2010: 44 : 263–271 Context Distributed medical education sites help train, recruit and retain doctors, notably in rural and isolated areas, by providing education and training in these areas and adapting their curriculum to meet the host community’s health needs. Objectives The Centre de Formation Médicale du Nouveau Brunswick (CFMNB; New Brunswick Medical Education Centre) was established by a partnership between two academic institutions, the Université de Sherbrooke (University of Sherbrooke), situated in the province of Quebec, and the Université de Moncton (University of Moncton), situated in the province of New Brunswick, in Canada. The CFMNB is specifically targeting a minority community (Acadians). Working to establish a high‐quality medical education programme, the CFMNB has also set community objectives to meet not only the health needs of this population, but also its social and economic needs. Methods This paper describes the overall objectives of this project, which are: to reduce the gap between community needs and academic institutional needs; to address ethno‐cultural and language differences in a defined minority population, and to develop collaboration between the partners involved, including government and community entities which are often perceived as operating in isolation from one another. We also describe why and how the CFMNB developed community‐focused objectives and the challenges that came with these innovations, and present lessons from the experience that may be relevant to other sites interested in the social responsibility of medical schools. Conclusions The CFMNB has produced interesting work and innovations in the field of social responsibility and has encountered many challenges. Continuing interaction between medical education, health research and health services to better address the needs of the population has been established. The information obtained by this process has been used to build a strategic plan for the CFMNB in order to ensure that it is socially responsive and has significant generalisable features.

Challenges, success factors and pitfalls: implementation of distributed medical education

“…Governance has a key role in medical education and DME implementation requires collaborative governance between multiple stakeholders; the importance of relationships and partnerships is highlighted in the PRISMS medical education model as well . Government involvement is essential, as shown in our study and reported by others . Early engagement of local physicians is essential as DME implementation temporarily disrupts social cohesiveness .…”

“…accreditation, educational alignment and new site development) and pursue other paths towards individual goals. It is known that the existence of alternate avenues for resolution undermines the collaborative process and keeping multiple stakeholders focused in setting up a DME site in Canada had presented political and practical challenges that were overcome through collaborations guided by strong leadership …”

The Best of Both Worlds: Resident Experiences of Urban and Regional Contexts in a Hybrid Pediatrics Residency Program

“…3 Distributed programs have typically been considered in the context of their outcomes, 4 social mission, 5 or workforce dimensions. 6,7 Rather than creating parallel community-only programs, most residency programs seem to have expanded to include both community and urban tertiary experiences, as indicated by descriptions of the introduction of community experiences to existing programs. 8,9 From a resident perspective, augmentation would appear to be the more useful model, as the additional training contexts allow for a more comprehensive learning experience.…”

Anatomy as the backbone of an integrated first year medical curriculum: Design and implementation

“…It is a private institution that specializes in training people of color and those individuals from under privileged backgrounds to address the healthcare needs of underserved populations. It excels in educating primary care physicians, meeting social mission (McCurdy et al, 1997; Mullan et al, 2010; Schofield and Bourgeois, 2010), and providing exceptional, culturally sensitive, patient care (Briggs and McBeath, 2010). The institution is dedicated to improving the health and well-being of individuals and communities; increasing the diversity of the health professional and scientific workforce; and addressing primary health care needs through programs in education, research, and service with emphasis on people of color and the underserved urban and rural populations.…”