The University of Sydney has announced that it is pushing back the commencement date of its postgraduate Doctor of Medicine in Dubbo to 2022 in time for the completion of the new facilities, and to provide sufficient time to review and learn its new curriculum.
Initially slated to start in January 2021, the program will take its first students a year later and will allow them to complete all four years of medical training at the University’s School of Rural Health in Dubbo. Currently, only the third and fourth years can be completed there.
Professor Cheryl Jones, Head of School and Dean of Sydney Medical School, said the program will adopt Sydney’s “innovative new medical curriculum” called the MD 2020 program, which was implemented this year.
“One of the new curriculum’s main aims is to ensure that students are ‘prepared for practice’, meaning they are ready to provide medical care for the complex, ever-changing environment of the 21st Century when they graduate,” she said.
Professor Jones added that rural health workforce training was among the program’s focus.
Meanwhile, Associate Professor Mark Arnold, Head of Sydney’s Rural Clinical School in Dubbo, expressed excitement about the program.
“We are very enthusiastic about the program. As with our Sydney MD program, students from diverse backgrounds will be encouraged to apply since diversity brings with it a range of life experiences that makes for better doctors,” he said.
Associate Professor Arnold added that one “major innovation” in the program was the way anatomy will be taught, which will involve the use of 2D and 3D visual technologies, virtual and augmented reality, and 3D printing.
Associate Professor Peter Malouf, Head of Indigenous Health of Sydney Medical School said that among the program’s goals was to provide education for rural residents and train Indigenous doctors.
“We hope the Dubbo program will build up the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander medical workforce and provide more opportunities for rural residents to study medicine,” he said.
The University has a long-standing presence in the Central West and Far Western New South Wales, with about 800 medical students taking one-year extended placements in Dubbo, Orange and Broken Hill. Many of these students have continued as doctors in the region.