CFHI was proud to send their Program Coordinator, Lyndsey Brahm, to the 2016 PEGASUS Conference that took place in Toronto […]
The beauty of competency-based education (CBE) is that it is fluid and flexible, promoting critical application of the course material with a focus on what students should be able to do, as opposed to a singular emphasis on knowledge. The ability of CBE to produce graduates who are competent professionals has made the approach increasingly popular among various health fields. In fact, The Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health (ASPPH), the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME), and the Canadian Medical Education Directives for Specialists (CanMEDS) have all developed core competencies for their programs.
The workshop coincided with the National Association of Advisors for the Health Professions (NAAHP) Annual Conference, held this year in San Francisco. Advisors were eager to discuss strategies for guiding students towards reputable programs and avoiding companies and experiences where students are encouraged to “do too much, too soon.” Case studies were presented, based on actual incidents from the field. Some were particularly alarming: undergraduates delivering babies, students conducting hospital rounds unsupervised, even instances of students scrubbing in for surgery!
Scholarships and funding initiatives are key to making real strides in south-to-south participation in global health internships and reducing their exclusivity as the domain of the wealthy. Crowdfunding is also growing, and is a powerful tool that should be considered by WHO and other global health internship providers to improve equitable access to global health and other professional internships abroad.
Fast forward to 2014. Global health has become a buzzword, conjuring up images of Bill and Melinda Gates projects and Partners in Health initiatives. Once a field that rallied for press, global health is receiving increasing limelight. Global health teaching in undergrad and medical curricula is also increasing and the 2013 Open Doors Report on International Educational Exchange, states study abroad by U.S. based students is steadily increasing and is at an all time high.
Rain or shine Seattle was brimming with energy and dialogue, as The University of Washington hosted the 11th Annual Western Regional International Health Conference (WRIHC), themed “Uncensored: Gender, Sexuality, & Social Movements in Global Health.” The largest student lead conference in the nation, nearly 600 attendees from around the country and the globe joined the dialogue around gender and sexuality, topics too often stigmatized and neglected. I was there as an alumna of three different Child Family Health International (CFHI) global health education programs, representing CFHI amongst an army of global health enthusiasts.
During this, the 19th annual National Public Health Week, let’s consider the definition of global health that appeared in The Lancet, “Global Health is Public Health.” What students will soon learn upon beginning their CFHI experience is the important reality that in many low and middle-income countries the lines they envision between public health and biomedicine are very much blurred. This is largely out of necessity demanded by sparse or finite resources, and evidence-based.
February 20th is World Social Justice Day. We would like to take this day to highlight one of our partners who has been working to achieve social justice. Dr. Rajagopal has been helping to reform the Hospice and Palliative Care laws in India through personal visits to patients and by building a strong system of doctors across the nation..
Give us a call or drop by anytime, we endeavour to answer all enquiries within 24 hours on business days.