Institutionalization of Reform Packages in the Scope of Medical Education

Dr. Bagher Larijani, the deputy of Educational Administration in the Ministry of Health, Hygiene and Medical Education, emphasized: the institutionalization of revolutionizing package for medical sciences education is being executed in the last 18 months.

According to WebDa, in the ceremony of 50^th establishment anniversary of School of Dentistry on Wednesday September 28^th, Dr. Larijani asserted: in the domain of graduate studies, universities must proceed on the basis of being knowledge based, responsive to country’s needs and requirements, mission-oriented, purposeful with the development, extending professional ethics, internationalizing and virtualizing. 

Referring to 65 universities of medical sciences throughout the country, he added: 250,000 students are currently studying in these universities, no matter governmental or non-governmental, with 20,000 faculty members teaching them.

Dr. Larijani asserted: at the moment in every province of the country, there is, on average, at least one medical sciences university. There are attempts to direct the development of country’s medical sciences universities in proportion to the population of the region and related indices.

The deputy of Educational Administration in the Ministry of Health, Hygiene and Medical Education admitted: despite the great capabilities of medical sciences universities in our country, international student admission is very limited. While in Turkey, a neighbor country of Iran, almost 72,000 international students are studying in medical sciences majors.

“The internationalization of medical sciences universities is among the goals and programs under execution, as the country’s educational potentials in medical domain are not fully and extensively benefited from. In so doing, the international accreditation is being administered for 18 medical sciences universities all over the country”, he said.

Indicating that 50% of responsibilities in the Ministry of Health, Hygiene and Medical Education is in the scope of medical Education, he averred: according to the latest world rankings such as ISI, the status of the country’s medical sciences universities has come to rank 20.

He went on: Iran has experienced dramatic growth within these two decades; especially in dentistry, we are in a favorable situation.

“The extension of dentistry schools in the country is organized based on spatial planning, and no new dentistry school is established in the country, except those school upon which there had been previous principal agreement”, he pointed out. “New schools will be established just in case, we would intend to proceed new targeted missions”.

In a part of his speech, Dr. Larijani averred: as to their national and international scientific products and scientific ranks, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences and Mashhad School of Dentistry enjoy a particular high status. Accordingly, some policymaking tasks in some domains of medical sciences education are delegated to this university.