Hong Kong Tobacco Control Study Tour
June 27, 2010
Participants of the study tour at the COSH headquarters.
On June 21-26, 2010 in Hong Kong, a tobacco control training program and study tour took place at the School of Public Health at the University of Hong Kong. With excellent coordination and logistical support by Sun Yat-Sen University School of Public Health and the University of Hong Kong, 36 participants from 13 CMB grantee schools, the China Preventative Medicine Association, and four staff members of the Beijing Office spent three days in Hong Kong touring several institutions and one day at Guangzhou City for a communication capacity training workshop.
The tour included visits to the University of Hong Kong, Kwai Chung Hospital, and the Hong Kong Council on Smoking and Health (COSH). In addition to these institutional visits, participants attended lectures and briefings by local tobacco control leaders and experts on topics ranging from the creation of an anti-tobacco medical university to best practices of tobacco control legislation. CMB’s Dr. Shaojun Ma gave a brief introduction to international best practice on creating tobacco-free campuses at the beginning of the workshop. Each lecture and briefing was followed by a lively question and answer period. The participants met with director of School of Public Professor Tai-Hing Lam, the HK government tobacco control office team headed by Dr. Lam Man-kin, chairwoman of COSH Ms. Lisa Lau, and representatives from Kwai Chung Hospital.
The training program concluded with a one-day training workshop at Guangzhou. Mr. James Liu, a media specialist serving as a CMB tobacco project consultant, led a training session focusing on how to formulate key messages for communication with and through media. During the training, attendees acted as spokespersons for a illustrative press meeting in order to improve their communication skills as related to their tobacco control work.
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CMB President Visits Mongolia
April 10, 2010
Top: Lincoln with staff of Dornogobi Medical College, including Dean Nyankhuu (second from right). Bottom: Traditional Mongolian musicians at a formal dinner.
In April 2010, CMB President Lincoln Chen visited Mongolia for four days. In the national capital of Ulaan Baatar, Lincoln was able to call on the President of the Health Sciences University of Mongolia, Professor Lkhagvasuren Tserenkhuugyin, and the Vice Minister of Health, Dr. Tsolmon Jadamba. The meetings provided an opportunity for CMB and Mongolia to review the status of its relationship, pointing towards future collaboration.
After an overnight train trip southeast to Dornogobi, Lincoln also visited Sainshaind, the Southeastern province that hosts the Dornogobi Medical College. In Dornogobi, he called on Dean Nyankhuu and Director of Foreign Affairs Otchonimeg Mangal to review the CMB grant to the rural medical college.
CMB has worked in Mongolia for over 15 years, beginning its grant-making work in 1993 with Sainshand Medical College and then Ulaan Baatar School of Nursing in 1994. The purpose of Lincoln's visit in April was to reaffirm these ties and explore directions for the future.
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Lincoln Chen Featured in the Lancet Profile
March 30, 2010
CMB President Dr. Lincoln Chen was recently featured in the Lancet. This profile can be downloaded here.
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Lancet Southeast Asia Series: Authors Workshop, Gadjah Mada Medical School, Yogyakarta, February 22-23, 2010
February 23, 2010
Workshop participants including Lancet's Bill Summerskill and Series Coordinator Rebecca Firestone visiting Borobudur in Yogyakarta
An ambitious and unusual Lancet series will engage scientists from 10 countries in Southeast Asia mapping health in this region which has a population size of over half a billion people, spanning wealthy countries like Singapore to extremely poor countries like Laos, populous countries like Indonesia to small states like Brunei spread across vast oceans. Strategically important because the region controls the energy supply lines to Japan and China, and economically important because the region has long been a crossroads of trade between China, India and Africa, health conditions in the region vary enormously between extremes. Indeed, within this single region, global health diversity is mirrored. How the region manages cooperation can offer lessons and insights into global health cooperation.
To review six draft theme papers, a Lancet Series on Health in Southeast Asia: Author’s Workshop was conducted at the Faculty of Medicine at Gadjah Mada University, engaging about 40 participants that included representatives from the sponsoring organizations: Lancet, Rockefeller Foundation, Atlantic Philanthropies, and China Medical Board. At least two authors for each of the six theme papers attended along with members of the Regional Steering Committee and the Scientific Advisory Group. The meeting was hosted by the medical school, and CMB's Dr. Rebecca Firestone coordinated the series.
Peer review was conducted on the six theme papers, noting some papers in good shape with others requiring remedial revisions. The project's timeline gives an additional four months before formal Lancet peer review. At the workshop, author groups convened and made preliminary revisions of draft papers, moving towards more rigorous revisions of the draft.
The theme papers are to be submitted by July 2010 for the Series publication which will be launched at the January 2011 Prince Mahidol Award Conference in Bangkok.
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Lancet-Japan Planning Meeting, Odawara, Japan, February 18-19, 2010
February 19, 2010
Lancet Managing Editor Bill Summerskill with Japan Center for International Exchange Tadashi Yamamoto and Keizo Takemi
Japan has the longest national life expectancy in the world. It also had nearly a half century of universal health coverage. What explains the Japan health phenomenon? How can lessons from Japan be mobilized for mutual learning in Japan and around the world? Answering these questions is the purpose of a series of papers to be commissioned in a Lancet Japan initiative.
Chaired by Keizo Takemi and Tadashi Yamamoto of the Japan Center for International Exchange, the Steering Committee members of the Lancet Japan series conducted a planning meeting with Lancet Managing Editor Bill Summerskill and CMB President Lincoln Chen at Odawara, Japan. Participating members included Hideki Hashimoto (Tokyo), Naoki Ikegami (Keio), Yasuki Kobayashi (Tokyo), Yasuhide Nakamura (Osaka), and Kenji Shibuya (Tokyo), joined by Sayako Kanamori of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Teiji Takei of the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare.
The Japanese Committee deliberated on 5-6 theme papers for a Lancet-Japan health series that is scheduled for publication in September 2011, 50 years after Japan achieved universal health coverage. Overall questions to be addressed by the commissioned studies are: How did Japan achieve the best life expectancy in the world? And what are the challenges for Japan’s universal coverage in the world’s most rapidly ageing society?
The commissioned papers by teams of authors will present draft papers at an International Conference scheduled for Tokyo in September 2010 with submission of final manuscripts by February 2011. Publication and launch of the Lancet Japan series is scheduled for September 2011.
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CMB 2010 Shenyang Conference on Priorities in Chinese Medical Education
January 11, 2010
Director of the North Medical education center-Professor Sun Baozhi speaking at the conference.
On January 10-11, 2010, leading faculty and experts from 24 medical universities/schools in China participated in a two-day conference focusing on Chinese medical education in Shenyang. China Medical University hosted the conference supported by a grant from the China Medical Board (CMB). The purpose of the conference was to provide a platform for China’s medical universities/schools at different levels to discuss the priorities in medical education.
The two-day conference consisted of three sessions. The first session featured activity reports from the four CMB-supported medical education centers - China Medical University, Peking Union Medical College, Sichuan University and Central South University. Over the past three decades, these four centers have introduced, adapted and promoted modern educational practices in China that have had an important impact on reforms in curriculum, pedagogy, evaluation and standardization. During the second session, Dr. Shi Pengjian, the deputy director general of the department of higher education from the Ministry of Education, delivered a speech on the future plan of China’s medical education. This was followed by a speech by Dr. Lu Zhaofeng, the president of Beijing Capital Medical University on an award-winning innovative model of producing and placing rural medical workers. Those keynote presentations inspired much discussion by the participants in the third session, which was organized around three themes - the role of the medical universities in health reform in China, the integration of the undergraduate-postgraduate-continuing medical education, and how to promote interdisciplinary practice in clinical medicine, nursing and public health. Many new ideas were raised and discussed at the conference. The conference also facilitated communications among China’s medical universities and colleges at all levels that can lead to collaborative opportunities in promoting medical education developments in China.
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GETTING HEALTH WORKERS TO UNDER-SERVED POPULATIONS:
Asian Action Alliance on Human Resources for Health, Hanoi, Vietnam
November 24, 2009
Vietnamese musician entertaining Asian participants.
China Medical Board joined the Vietnam Ministry of Health, WHO, World Bank, and the Rockefeller Foundation to support an Asian conference to promote "getting committed health workers to the underserved areas: a challenge for health systems." The Asia-wide regional meeting was conducted by the Asian Action Alliance on Human Sources for Health in Hanoi, Vietnam on November 23-24, 2009. Over 150 participants from more than 20 Asian countries set delegates to the meeting to examine evidence, share country experiences, and offer recommendations. Opened by the Vietnamese Vice-Minister of Health, Madame Nguyen Thi Kim Tien, the meeting also featured welcoming by Dr. Mubashar Sheikh of the Global Health Workforce Alliance, Dr. Suwit of AAAH, and Dr. Manuel Dayrit of WHO. Dr. Lincoln Chen of the China Medical Board gave the conference keynote address. Over two days, the delegates participated in plenary and break-out sessions organized around four major strategic approaches to this health equity challenge - education, regulation, incentives, and systems support. Recommendations from the meeting would be fed into a WHO Expert Group for consideration of more developed formal regulations to be presented at the May 2010 World Health Assembly.
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Vietnam Hoi An Lancet Southeast Asia Workshop
October 10, 2009
Hosted by the Hanoi School of Public Health and funded by The Atlantic Philanthropies, an authors’ workshop for the Second Lancet Southeast Asia Health Series was conducted in Hoi An, Vietnam on October 8-9, 009. Moderated by Vice-Dean Tran Huu Bich and later joined by Dean Le Vu Anh, the workshop opened with welcoming comments by Ariel Pablos-Mendez of the Rockefeller Foundation, Bill Summerskill of The Lancet, Le Nhan Phuong of the Atlantic Philanthropies, and CMB Trustee Jane Henney. Altogether, 35 participants attended this meeting at which lead authorship teams presented outlines of six theme papers seeking suggestions for paper improvements. In addition to the authors and sponsors, the workshop was also attended by the Series’ Regional Steering Committee (Suwit Wibulpolprasert of Thailand, Khor Geok Lin of Malaysia, and Jose Acuin of the Philippines) and Scientific Advisory Group (Abbas Bhuiya of Bangladesh, Ruth Bonita of New Zealand, Virasakdi Chongsuvivatwong of Thailand, Phua Kai Hong of Singapore, Tomas Palu based in Vietnam, and Kenji Shibuya of Japan).
The Lancet Southeast Asia Series was launched in May 2009 at a regional consultation hosted by the China and Medical Board, the Rockefeller Foundation, and The Lancet in Bangkok. The goals of the Series are to present the regional health situation to global health audiences as well as to highlight priority health challenges in the region. Teams of regional authors will work on drafting research papers throughout 2010, aiming for publication and launch of the Series in January 2011. The next authors’ workshop is scheduled for Indonesia on February 22-23, 2010.
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CMB Launches Rural Medical Network in Western China
September 17, 2009
Top: CMB delegation and University hosts at Huang Guo Shu Waterfall
Bottom: CMB Trustee Dr. Tom Inui with pediatric patients at a village clinic in Guizhou
Leaders from 13 medical universities in China participated in a Workshop on Rural Medical Education on September 15-16, 2009 sponsored by the CMB and hosted by Guiyang Medical University in Guizhou province. 
The purpose of the workshop was to share experiences and plan joint activities for strengthening medical practitioners serving disadvantaged populations in China’s nine Western provinces – Gansu, Guangxi, Guizhou, Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, Qinghai, Tibet, Xinjiang, and Yunan. University leaders were joined by senior officials from the Ministry of Health and provincial health departments backed by four resource universities (China Medical University, Jiujiang, Sichuan, Xian) which offered insights on how to shape medical education to better serve rural populations. At the workshop conclusion, three working groups recommended specific actions for three-year training programs, five-year medical degree programs, and continuing medical education. Consensus was achieved to launch an ongoing network amongst interested medical universities to share curriculum, training materials, field research, and policy dialogue on how to improve the supply as well as enhance the demand for professional health workers in rural areas of Western China. Before next year’s annual meeting of the network a series of collaborative activities will be launched by network members.
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CMB Launches Faculty Development Awards
September 1, 2009
On September 1, 2009, CMB in collaboration with the Institute of International Education (IIE) announced the launching of the CMB Faculty Development Award program. The program was supported by a CMB grant to IIE and aims to develop capacities in health policy and systems sciences (HPSS) in China's major medical universities. The program will support promising faculty members below 45 years of age from the 13 CMB grantee universities to pursue fellowship studies overseas for 2-6 months. The application will include two parts: the school's nomination of up to four candidates by September 25, 2009; and the application of the nominated applicants by December 1, 2009. The schools have been asked to nominate faculty members whose proposed study is in line with the priority HPSS areas set by the institutional assessment submitted to CMB earlier. The individual application will feature a detailed "study plan" among other things. The level of support will be maximally at US$ 30,000. The awardees must start study no later than December 31, 2009. This program is a component of CMB's longer and broader strategy for strengthening the most promising young faculty in its 13 affiliated medical universities.
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Tibet Visit by CMB Trustees Delegation
July 28, 2009
Top: Drs. Jeff and Carol Koplan outside the Potala Palace in Lhasa, Tibet.
Bottom: Dr. Harvey Fineberg visiting a township health clinic.
Starting off on the high altitude train for Lhasa from Xining City in Qinghai, a CMB delegation called on the Tibet University Medical College on July 24, 2009. The CMB delegation included President Lincoln Chen and Trustees Drs. Jeff Koplan and Harvey Fineberg joined by colleagues. In addition to reviewing currently shared activities, the Delegation toured the Medical College campuses and visited the Dang Xiong local county hospital and the Qu Shui county township clinic. The county hospital is adjacent to Na Mu Cuo Lake, reportedly the highest salt water lake in the world at 15,000 feet, and the township clinic is based in a fertile valley near Lhasa.
The Delegation reviewed 16 years of cooperation that included 15 CMB grants to the Medical College totalling $5.8 million; the last two grants supported the 5-year medical curriculum and high altitude health research. Future collaboration was discussed regarding extending rural medical education and surveys of high priority health problems in Tibet Autonomous Region.
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CMB China Nursing School Network Meeting
July 26, 2009
Professor Linda Aiken (University of Pennsylvania) with network meeting participants.
Eight deans of China's leading nursing schools met at the Peking Union Medical College (PUMC) in Beijing on July 26, 2009 to continue to build a China network of leading nursing schools. Coordinated by Dean You Liming of Sun Yat-Sen University School of Nursing and advised by Professor Linda Aiken of the University of Pennsylvania, the network meeting was hosted by Dean Huaping Liu of PUMC. The network is an informal association that brings together deans of nursing from eight of China's leading nursing schools to jointly work on research, education, and external engagement. Featured at this meeting was a multi-centric policy study on the impact of the medical work environment on nurses and patient care with particular emphasis on quality of care, patient safety, and efficiency of services. Other themes include advanced doctoral training and community nursing. The network meeting preceded a joint course organized by the eight schools to teach advanced research skills to doctoral student candidates across the different schools. At the conclusion of the network meeting, the Deans announced the next meeting to be conducted in Shanghai on April 12, 2010.
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