Global minimum essential requirements: a road towards competence-oriented medical education.

Full Abstract

With the growing globalization of medicine and the emerging concept of a 'global profession of physicians', the issue of the essential competences that all physicians must possess becomes sharply focused. If defined, these competences would help indicate what teachers are supposed to teach, what students are expected to learn and what educational experiences all physicians must have. The 'minimum essential competences' that all graduates must have if they wish to be called physicians were identified by the Institute for International Medical Education (IIME), sponsored by the China Medical Board of New York, through working groups of educational and health policy experts and representatives of major international medical education organizations. In the first phase of the project, seven domains have been identified that define the knowledge, skills, professional behavior and ethics that all physicians must have, regardless of where they received their general medical training. Appropriate tools to assess each of the domains have been identified. In the second phase of the project the 'global minimum essential requirements' (GMER) will be implemented experimentally in a number of Chinese medical schools. The aim of the third phase will be to share the outcomes of this educational experiment, aimed at improving the quality of medical education, with the global education community.

Author information

Author/s: Schwarz, M Roy (MR); Wojtczak, Andrzej (A);

Affiliation: Institute for International Medical Education, White Plains, New York. rschwarz(-atsign-)chinamedicalboard.org

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article

Journal: Medical teacher (Med Teach), published in England. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2002-Mar; vol 24 (issue 2) : pp 125-9

Dates: Created 2002/07/05; Completed 2002/09/06; Revised 2007/11/15;

PMID: 12098430, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 2/18/2009, IMS Date: )

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

External Links for this article
(including full text providers, if available):

Click Electronic Full-text Provider Links to see options for finding the electronic full text links to this article. Note there may be a subscription or fee required for access to the full text. See our FAQ for information on finding FREE full text articles.

This article may also be located in paper journal collections available in many libraries. Use the Journal and Publication Information above to find the full article.