Perceptions of graduating students from eight medical schools in Vietnam on acquisition of key skills identified by teachers

Table 1 General information about the medical schools involved in the project

Name of school (coded)⁽¹⁾	Year was setup	No. of staff (2003)	No. of 6^thyear general medical students (2003)⁽²⁾	Catchment areas	Availability of school skill-lab⁽³⁾	No. of field teaching sites⁽⁴⁾
School A	1902	917	359	Whole country	Yes (2004)	5
School B	1947	982	286	Whole country	Yes (1999)	3
School C	1957	523	219	Central & Coast (15 provinces)	Yes (2004)	3
School D	1968	327	240	Northern mountains (12 provinces)	Yes (2005)	5
School E	1968	374	93	Red River Delta (8 provinces)	Yes (1999)	4
School F	1977	100	95	Central Highland (4 provinces)	No	2
School G	1979	325	106	Mekong River Delta (17 provinces)	Yes (1996)	3
School H	1979	203	130	North East & Coast (8 provinces)	No	3
Total			1,528

* Note: ⁽¹⁾ These schools have produced about 1,500 – 2,000 new general medical doctors each year, who will serve in catchment areas covering from 80 – 90% population in Vietnam. Three medical schools were not involved are military or provincial schools.
⁽²⁾ Numbers of the 6^th year general medical students did not correspond with numbers of staff, since each school were assigned to focus on different kind of students.
⁽³⁾ Two schools have no skill-lab at school level but there are several small skill-labs at department level and only schools had skill lab before 2003 could contribute for training this study cohort.
⁽⁴⁾ All of FT sites are districts in rural or suburban areas, in which there are 15–30 communes with one commune health center in each commune to serve from 3,000 – 10,000 inhabitants.

ISSN: 1472-6920