Professionalism in medical education stressed

LAHORE

Secretary, Specialised Healthcare and Medical Education Punjab, Najam Ahmad Shah has said that most complaints are about doctors’ behaviour and not their lack of knowledge.

Speaking at the inaugural session of an international conference on medical education at the University of Health Sciences (UHS) here on Friday he said although the primary role of a doctor was that of the healer, one must simultaneously maintain professionalism in medical practice.

“Medical professionalism is more relevant now than ever before, partly because of recent high profile cases that have highlighted poor professionalism”, he added.

Najam Ahmad Shah emphasised the need of redefining and developing professionalism in today’s undergraduate and postgraduate medical education. He said students perceived role models as the most important influence on their development of professionalism.

Higher Education Commission’s (HEC) Executive Director, Prof Dr Arshad Ali said the concept of professionalism in medicine needed to be adapted and change in an increasingly consumerist healthcare sphere.

“A patient’s trust in a doctor is no longer assumed; it is reached through a display of appropriate professional qualities such as expertise, probity, integrity and many other things.”

Prof Arshad said true professionalism came into play where mistakes were made. “Knowing what to do when things go wrong and how to react appropriately can make all the difference in ensuring high standards of patient care”, he opined.

The President, Islamic World Science Citation Centre (ISC), Shiraz, Iran, Dr Mohammad Javed Dehghani, said Pakistan had showed excellent performance in the form of increase in number of publications in the field of medical and health science.

“In last 15 years, the number of research publications in basic medical sciences has increased 1,476 percent (from 68 in year 2000 to 1,072 in year 2015), in clinical sciences 1,313 percent (106 in year 2000 to 1,526 in year 2015), and 775 percent in health sciences (53 in year 2000 to 464 in year 2015)”, he informed.

Iranian Deputy Counsel General in Lahore Ali Asghar said UHS should play a key role in promoting multi-disciplinary research in the country.

UHS Vice-Chancellor, Maj-Gen (r) Prof Muhammad Aslam said Islamic World Science Citation Centre (ISC) was establishing it sub-office at UHS which would become a leading source of scientific research data compilation and analysis in the region.

UHS Pro-Vice-Chancellor Prof Junaid Sarfraz Khan, Director Medical Education, Prof IA Naveed, President, Council for Collaboration in Medical Education (CCME) Dr Mussarat-ul-Hasnain and Secretary General CCME, Prof Dr Nadeem Hafeez Butt also spoke on the occasion.

The theme of the three-day conference “Medical Professionalism in Challenging Times: Blending Local Values with Global Standards”, is being organised from the platform of Council for Collaboration in Medical Education (CCME), in collaboration with HEC Pakistan, Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC), College of Physicians and Surgeons Pakistan (CPSP), Punjab Higher Education Commission (PHEC), Pakistan Medical Research Council (PMRC), Pakistan Science Foundation (PSF) and Pakistan Nursing Council (PNC). The three-day moot is also endorsed by the Association for Medical Education in Europe (AMEE).

More than 1,500 health professionals, educationists, healthcare delivery providers, policy-makers, medical students and allied health specialists will attend the conference, including some of the world authorities in medical education from United Kingdom, United States of America, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Australia, Singapore, Iran and Saudi Arabia.