The Social Medicine Portal

Havana Medical Education Conference & the US students studying medicine in Cuba

Students represent their country at ELAM

Last week, Havana’s Hotel Nacional was the setting for the Medical Education for the 21st Century conference (see our posting of May 11, 2008).  Among the groups participating in this conference were PAHO, ALAMES, the Global Health Education Consortium (GHEC), MEDICC and the Cuban Ministry of Public Health.

There were a fair number of US citizens at the conference and we are fortunate that US Pediatrician David Keller (of UMass Medical School) has posted a day-by-day description of the conference (along with a few pictures) on his blog Rosie D and Me.  He notes: “The conference is fabulous and oversubscribed (> 700 attendees), but the facility is not perfectly designed for such a number. So it is sometimes a little crowded; they didn’t make arrangements for such a number to tour hospitals and the medical school, and I was unable to get my name on the proper list to have that opportunity. Still, the atmosphere is electric. People from all over the world (I heard 22 countries, but I have no official word on who is here) are gathered to discuss the complexity of integrating social medicine (for want of a better word) into the lexicon of medical education. Each country faces challenges consistent with the way in which their health care system is designed.”

Another participant in the conference, my colleague Sherenne Simon, has posted photos of Cuba and the conference on Picasa.

One of the benefits of having  US attendees in Havana was that they go to meet with the US students studying at the Latin American School of Medicine (see our posting Studying Medicine in Cuba: The Experience of Two US Students).  Figuring out how to support these students in their transition back to the United States is a challenge.  Medical education in Cuba is quite different from the US.  However, as a group, the ELAM (Escuela Latinoamericana de Medicina) students seem highly motivated (who else would spend six years living as scholarship student in Cuba?), speak Spanish, and have a commitment to work in under-served areas on their return to the US.  In some ways, they are ideal residency candidates for a US health care system that struggles to provide clinicians to many underserved communities.

One of the ELAM students provided us with a link to letters that student Ramon Alejandro Bernal has been sending back to his hometown Seattle. These are available at the website of Western Washington PNHP. ELAM has its own publication, Panorama: Cuba y Salud available at www.panorama.sld.cu.  Articles have abstracts in English.

Any readers that might be interested in helping the US ELAM students out, can contact me.  Their main interest is in finding clinical placements in the US during their summer breaks.

Finally, the keynote address was given by Dr. Charles Boelen, of the WHO’s Human Resources for Health Department:  Entitled “Social Accountability: Medical Education’s Boldest Challenge” Dr. Boelen notes: “Until recently, the prevailing assumption was that community orientation and posting, along with problem-based learning, were adequate for medical schools to serve social needs. But now, this notion of social accountability has emerged, meriting attention worldwide, even within traditional medical circles. This concept urges medical schools to go beyond pedagogical innovations and search for optimal integration of their graduates into health systems.” This paper was published in the most recent edition of MEDICC Review which has several excellent articles on international experience in Teaching for Health Equity.

posted by: Matt Anderson, MD