Done by : Salim AL-Habsi
Brief idea about my elective:
I did my elective courses in International Islamic University of Malaysia from 11 of May 2009 to
4 of august 2009. My training was in HTAA hospital in the city of kuantan (one of the biggest city
of Malaysia) about 300 Km away from the capital city.
The hospital consists of eight floors. It contains all the major departments include medicine,
surgery, paediatric and obstetric and gynecology. It has compose for medical teaching, library
and computer labs,
I did three courses for total number of eight weeks, (general medicine for three weeks, obstetric
and gynecology for three weeks and general paediatric for two weeks). We were a group of four
students. We stayed in a hotel (around 1 Km away from the hospital) for whole the period. I
have chosen International Islamic University of Malaysia to do my elective since we have some
knowledge about the university and the way of teaching is very similar to our curriculum.
Our daily life starts at 7.30 in the morning when we leave the hotel. In the hospital we used to
join the morning round done by the doctor, then at 10 am we used to have bedside teaching
with other students. We have break for one hour. At two o’clock we used to attend seminars or
case presentations done by students. At four we return back to the hotel. Sometimes we used to
attend on call rounds with doctors on call.
Benefits:
1. Compare and contrast between health care delivery systems in Oman and
Malaysia.
2. Provide information of some medical experiences for medical students in
Malaysia.
3. I had opportunity to see some medical cases that are not common in my
countries and how doctors approach these cases.
4. I had examined patient-doctor relationships in different cultures.
5. I benefits from seeing characteristics of chronic diseases in different countries.
6. Examine blending of traditional and non traditional healing methods within a
culture.
7. People in Malaysia are very patient with us.
8. I had opportunity to see different way of treatment and different protocols used in
management of some health problems.
9. We attended some deliveries and we did some gynecological examinations.
Difficulties:
1. Most of the patients do not speak English, so we got some troubles with
communications.
2. We have only met fifth year students, because seventh year student have
finished their exams.
Suggestions for improvement:
1. It is better to be evaluated by exam or grading at the end of each rotation.
2. If the elective course start earlier, so that we be able to meet seventh year
students in Malaysia.
3. It is better to have one instructor responsible and take care for us.
4. To make the duration of the elective shorter (six weeks is enough).
Summary of costs:
Flight tickets 200 OR
Accommodation 300 OR
Internal transport 100 OR
Daily life 200 OR
Institution 50 OR
Others 150 OR
Total money spend 1150 OR