Global Medicine – The Netherlands (IFMSA NL)

Name of the activity: Global Medicine

Country/NMO: The Netherlands (IFMSA NL)

Program: Medical Education Systems

Contact information: [email protected]

Type of the activity: Education

General description:

Medical students realize globalization and global health are very important in their later work as doctors, and they feel more attention should be paid to global health in their education. Our approach to this problem is informing and educating medical students by publishing a magazine and posting on our website, in addition to the medical curricula. Global Medicine is made by a group of students from all over the Netherlands. Their medical background and international network enables them to focus on different, up-to-date subjects in the area of global health. The articles are written by experts from all over the world, who derive their knowledge from experience, profession or education.
Our goals are: – To increase knowledge about global health by easy to read opinion based, medical or research articles and news in the field of global health; – To inform about the opportunities and benefits of an international exchange; to stimulate students to study and live abroad, to inspire about to start careers in global health; – To stimulate participation in global health projects at home and abroad, by sharing experiences; – To encourage students and young professionals to write articles as well as learn about the process of publishing articles; – To create awareness and responsibility toward the society in the field of global health problems.
During our visits at medical students meetings all around the world, we have learned that students feel that there isn’t enough attention for this topic in their curriculum. Therefore, this project is of great value for increasing knowledge about global health.

Focus area:

Sharing information about global health in different countries via a newsplatform

Problem statement:

Globalization is a phenomenon that has been rapidly accelerating. We can no longer see ourselves as inhabitants of one country, but rather have to identify ourselves as world citizens. Medical students realize globalization and global health are very important in their later work as doctors, and they feel more attention should be paid to global health in their education. Our approach to this problem is informing and educating medical students by publishing a magazine and sharing our content on our website, in addition to the medical curricula. Global Medicine is made by a group of students from all over the Netherlands. Their medical background and international network enables them to focus on different, up-to-date subjects in the area of global health. The articles are written by experts from all over the world, who derive their knowledge from experience, profession or education. During our visits at medical students meetings all around the world, we have learned that students feel that there isn’t enough attention for this topic in their curriculum. Therefore, this project is of great value for increasing knowledge about global health.

Target groups and beneficiaries:

Global Medicine is made by a group of students from all over the Netherlands. The content of the magazine/website is created by medical students from all around the world. We spread the magazine in all the local IFMSA’s in the Netherlands. The magazine can be sold to other NMO’s. The content can also be found on our website. Our primary target group are medical students and other medical health professional.

Objectives and indicators of success:

Global Medicine has a vision to raise continuous and broad awareness and improve the knowledge of global health. To attain this, we make medical students and young medical professionals aware of global health subjects, improve their knowledge on those subjects and stimulate them to contribute to improving global health. Global Medicine has formulated clear goals to attain the main objetive:
– To inform and to increase knowledge about global health by easy to read opinion based, medical or research articles and news in the field of global health;
– To inform about the opportunities and benefits of an international excange and studying and living in other countries;
– To inform and inspire about possible future global health careers;
– To stimulate participation in global health projects at home and abroad, by sharing experiences;
– To create a database of published articles on the website, that is diverse regarding subjects, regions and authors;
– To encourage students and young professionals to write articles to disclose their own specialty to a bigger public as well as learn about the process of publishing articles;
– To create conscience, awareness and responsibility toward the society in the field of global health problems.

Methodology:

Our content is key to informing (medical) students about global health. We aim to publish a magazine with articles by authors with multiple points of view, experiences and various cultural backgrounds. Therefore articles are not only written by Dutch students and health professionals, but by students and health professionals from all over the world. Our editor team helps students to write a high quality article and thereby gives them a unique chance to tell their story to a big audience.
Secondly we aim to reach as many medical students as possible by publishing the magazine globally via our website and selling it to other NMO’s. The printed magazine is freely available at all medical faculties in The Netherlands and the digital magazine is sent to our international subscribers list. Additionally we regularly update our website and Facebook. We also go to as many international medical meetings in the Netherlands and outside as possible to promote the magazine and the possibilities. We have been present at ISCOMS in Groningen, EuRegMe in Greece, IFMSA GA in Mexico, EMSA AA in Kosovo, IFMSA GA in Montenegro and EMSA SA in Slovenia.

The project has a coordinator and four teams: The editor team is responsible for the content. They contact the writers and help them with writing the articles. They have now edited all the articles for the next edition and are writing some final short articles themselves. The lay-out team has been responsible for designing the new lay-out and is responsible for putting together each edition. The PR team is responsible for acquisition, promotion, collaborations and public relations. They have now almost finished contacting their list of 140 potential sponsors. Now there are busy with contacting subsidies. The webmaster is responsible for the Global Medicine website. The website team is working on updating the website. The coordinator is responsible for the financial aspects of the project, keeps in contact with the separate teams and guards the progress of the project.

Timeline for one edition*:
Week: Who: What:
Week 1 Editors Send out request for articles
PR Start acquisition
PR Regularly update facebook
Week 2-10 Editors Articles revision, contact with authors
PR Acquisition
Week 11 Lay-out + editors Start lay-out of the magazine, working closely with the editors
Week 12-15 Lay-out + editors Further lay-out of the magazine, working closely with the editors
PR Acquisition
Week 16 Lay-out Finalizing the new magazine + content for the website
Week 17 PR Distribution of the magazine + promotion
Website Content on the website
*Continuous tasks )eg promotion at international meetings) have been left out of this timeline

Plans for evaluation:

Immediate impact:
• Medical students (and any others with an interest in global health) get informed about global health. Their interest is piqued and their knowledge and awareness are increased.
Indicators of immediate impact:
• Activity on our website and our Facebook page. This will give us an indication of how many students have an interest in and have read our articles.
• We will evaluate the impact with the external representations of the local committees in the Netherlands (Groningen, Leiden, Maastricht, Nijmegen, Rotterdam, Utrecht, UvA, VUmc). They are responsible of promoting and distributing the magazine on a local level.
• The number of potential authors that contacts us will also give us an indication of the interest in (writing about) global health among medical students.
• Questionnaire for medical students