Dr. dr. Ratna Sitompul, Sp.M(K)
Chairwoman, ASEAN Medical Schools Network’s Exchange Program Working Group
ASEAN Medical Schools Network’s Exchange Programmes offer opportunities for medical students to learn, participate and study the healthcare system of their selected country. In addition, they would learn about the society and its culture. The student exchange programmes are also known as an elective and its duration is eight weeks during students’ clinical years.
The medical students who wish to carry out their elective (or exchange programme) should apply six months ahead and have at least one year of clinical training. Applicants could select their preferred discipline, and successful applicants will be supervised and evaluated. In contrast to student exchanges, academic and faculty exchanges are less well structured and are usually carried out at the individual level.
The idea of student exchange could be extended to outreach programmes and sports events between institutions. However, not every institution would recognize credit transfer for student exchange programmes for now. It was also mentioned that sharing of information on student exchange programmes of each institution in a common website should be made possible. The division (working group) of student could work on this mechanism in the nearest future. The faculty exchange is defined to be faculty exchange in the forms of medical teaching and clinical training.
