Experiences from Family Medicine Learning Designed for Foreign Medical Students at Sichon Hospital

Abstract

Experiences from Family Medicine Learning Designed for Foreign Medical Students

Nowadays, family medicine became more interest to medical students not only for Thai but also from various countries around the world. Family physicians had the roles in teaching and managing the learning process to foreign medical students who applied for studying in elective course. Sichon Hospital provided the internship placement since 2007 with the purposes of creating the learning process among Thai doctors and international medical students as well as exchanging international culture. The learning activities were available in hospitals and at the primary care units including community care procedures and patient home visits. Throughout the period of accepting students for 12 years since 2007, there were international medical students in total of 81 people from 9 countries, mostly from the United States accounted for 27.16 percent, followed by Austria accounted for 25.92 percent; however, the overall most students were from European countries. The results of the data analysis from feedback evaluation revealed that most medical students agreed with the activities in line with the learning goals accounted for 91.35 percent, the useful help from preceptor accounted for 93.82 percent, and the appropriate duration of study accounting for 86.42. The major role of family physicians was to be a preceptor in terms of academic content and as an advisor to provide guidance on the learning processes and feedback reflection at the end of study program. The management of learning model depended mainly on the learner objectives and varieties of learning activities which were the important factors that made the learning process successful and achieving the goal.