Medicine

New School of Medicine at UPC

The innovative alternative in medical education in Peru

UPC School of Medicine is a result of a meticulous work of analysis on the status of medical training in Peru, as well as health needs in the country.   On the same time, considers the most successful and recent international experiences, incorporating modern learning methodology and the latest technology on medicine education, turning this school into the most modern and innovative in medical education.

Since its foundation, UPC’s proposal is oriented to an educative model, solid and innovative, based on learning and on the evaluation of competences, personalized education, academic exigency, and a modern and efficient management.  This background, allows UPC to go into this vanguard and unique project.

Furthermore, UPC School of Medicine is supported by Laureate International Universities, the most important private universities network.  Seven of their twenty two universities offer Health Science programs.  Additionally, important cooperation and exchange agreements will be signed to benefit the students.

UPC School of Medicine is the first one that was created under the exigent standards of the Peruvian Commission for the Accreditation of Medical Schools (CAFME).

A solid professional, an integral human being

 “We train medical doctors who are leaders committed to an integral conception of manhood and health, who are oriented to service with a human and ethic attitude,  who are prepared to work and lead multidisciplinary teams, highly competitive to evaluate, research and solve health problems in the most effective and innovative way.”

Educational model that develops professional competences

In this innovative proposal, UPC applies an Educational Model Based on Competences that represents the most important revolution in medical education for the 21st century and currently constitutes a predominant tendency in the schools of medicine around the world.

This model implies the development of the curricula, the contents, the activities, the practices and evaluations of the courses in order to assure that the students, in addition to the medical knowledge, will acquire the necessary skills to practice it with a professional attitude.  This is not new for UPC that had successfully applied an education based on competences for the last 12 years.

So, applying this model to UPC’s Medicine program, a medical education based on personal and professional competences is guaranteed. 

UPC School of Medicine integrates its curricula with a methodological proposal through which students have the main role in the teaching – learning process.  These methodologies –through practice and research - encourage the analysis and discovery.

Problem Based Learning (PBL)

Through this methodology, students will apply and integrate their basic science and clinical knowledge to a real and specific health problem.  They will analyze cases in small groups, and will propose solutions on the same time that they will develop professional skills that would be part of their profile.

Faculty as facilitators

The proposed methodologies by UPC School of Medicine imply a new role for faculty and will also require a special dedication to their training.  Oriented to form them as real facilitators of learning, who are capable to create in the class a better environment for an active teaching where the student has the main role.

The UPC teaching training program includes up to 40 work hours, containing issues such as:

• Curricular designed by competences
• Active methodology
• Problem Based Learning (PBL)
• Evaluation by competences

As part of this training, a Micro-Teaching Program is applied. In order to analyze their qualities, their strengths and the opportunities to improve, professors are video taped during their classes.

Modern and flexible curricula

UPC School of Medicine is rational in the number of students; it is selective, not no massive.  It proposes constant work in small groups oriented by an advisor and a direct work with the community.   Based on this proposal; a Problem Based Learning (PBL) is applied, using rooms for no more than 12 persons, with Internet access and data bases.

UPC Medicine program is developed in seven years; the curriculum is flexible and organized by semesters during the first three years.  On the sixth year, the student will do clinical clerkships, after that a year of internship.

The main strategies of the medical program are:

• Adaptation to the country reality
• Solid scientific training
• Contact with patients since the first academic term
• Integration between Basic Sciences and Clinics
• Learning of clinical abilities as well as patient handling, with real patients and also simulated patients, manikins and electronic models.  

Elective internships
The curriculum offers to the student the option to participate, during four- months, in health specialized services in Peru or abroad, in any of the Laureate universities or other schools of medicine that have agreements with UPC.  These clinical rotations will be offered since the sixth year, allowing students to deepen in one of the classic clinic areas, and defining then their specialization area.

Clinical clerkships
During the year of rotations, the student works in clinics and hospitals under the supervision of an advisor, having the classic rotations (clinical, pediatrics, obstetrics & gynecology, and surgery), as well as emergency medicine and rural medicine.  Finally, the student participates in an Integrating Seminar, oriented to actualize him on the latest knowledge available. 

Infrastructure and cutting-edge equipment

The design of the School of Medicine has special areas for teaching that include the most modern infrastructure for learning, practicing and researching

• Multi-functional basic sciences laboratories
• Laboratories dedicated to the practice of Physics, Chemistry, Physiology, Pharmacology, Microbiology, Biochemistry, Histology, Anatomy and Pathology.
• Skills laboratory:
  • Typical office
  • Treatment units
  • Simulated surgery room and intensive care unit
  • Robots and manikins simulating real patients with a variety of symptoms 

Thanks to these infrastructure and technology, the student moves forward in his practical experience of the first years, and will demonstrate better skills on his contact with patients, increasing his possibility of a faster learning in a shorter time, during that session.

A controlled environment like the skills laboratory is ideal for the development of professional competences, as well as for demonstration of abilities in treating patients.

Research Center in Biomedical Sciences

A complex of laboratories developed with last generation equipments are part of the School and represent an opportunity for the students to enhance their analysis skills, and the application of the scientific method.

This center was planned to progressively achieve the following goals:

• Develop relevant research for the country
• Promote the training of medicine professionals
• Train professors  masters and doctors in Sciences
• Develop biomedical and biotechnological products