Educación médica en América Latina: Venezuela

The number of Specialization Courses as well as the Masters have increased, so that by 2012, there were 171 Postgraduate Courses fully functioning in the Faculty of Medicine of the UCV and in total there are 351 Specialization Courses, Masters and Doctorates In the Medical Schools of the Venezuelan Universities. Admission to postgraduate courses is done through admission tests organized by the Postgraduate Studies Commissions of the respective Faculties of Medicine. The student receives during the years of training a salary scholarship from the host institution of the postgraduate course. Once the postgraduate residence is finished and after the defense of a Special Degree Work (TEG), the university degree is conferred by the corresponding university. In recent years, a serious situation has arisen, as regards the Specialization Courses, such as the marked decrease in the annual demand for these courses, a phenomenon that has affected most of them, with their evident repercussions on the number of postgraduate residents in hospitals. Research indicates among the factors that are causing this problem are: the evident phenomenon of medical migration that is occurring in Venezuela, low remuneration, continued governmental disqualification towards the national medical profession and preference given to foreign doctors, personal insecurity, the positive attitude of other nations to the possibility of well-trained Venezuelan physicians, the burden of care, and the deterioration of the infrastructure of our health centers. A proposal is made for the transformation of medical education in Venezuela; to construct a friendly and transferable methodology for the design of Curricula by Professional Competence with the objective of orienting the process of curricular transformation of the medical studies in degree and postgraduate in the country. There are many barriers but we have taken up the challenge and will take advantage of the resources to improve our pedagogical practices.