Last week we had the eleventh congress of the combined medicine studies program (PECEM) of the UNAM School of Medicine and what I saw that day gave me so much pleasure that I decided to bring it to this space. Good news is refreshing.
PECEM is a unique program of its kind in Mexico. In eight years, a student earns a bachelor’s degree and a doctorate in medicine. It is a program to generate doctors who are also clinical researchers and, it is expected of them, that scientific research becomes the axis of their career. Students with an average of 9 or more at the end of the first year of the degree are invited to consider entering the program. It is highly demanding. If by itself, to have a good career in medicine requires a lot of study, work and perseverance, this program adds challenges. Accepted students, starting in the second year, take an additional subject each semester, which has to do with research and rotate with a research tutor, who can be from basic, clinical or epidemiological sciences. Permanence in the program depends on maintaining a minimum average of 9. By the end of the fourth year, they have gone through eight different research experiences. With this background they are in a reasonable position to choose in which topic and with which tutor they would like to do their doctoral thesis. At the end of the undergraduate internship, they start their doctoral thesis, for which they have three years. So there are 4 years of medicine, one year of internship and three of doctoral thesis.
Photo: Special
The program was approved by the University Council in 2011 and started with three or four students in the first generation. Since it began, I have had the pleasure of belonging to the academic committee as one of the clinical research representatives, thanks to the invitation of Dr. Ana Flisser, who has been responsible for the program all these years, in which she has done it with excellence. and devotion.
The first PECEM congress took place in 2013. With less than 10 students who brought a poster presenting what they were working on in turn rotation at that time. Last week was the eleventh congress. 120 students attended, the majority because they belong to one of the 12 generations that have joined the program and the rest, because they are from other programs, but the congress caught their attention. PECEM currently has 99 students, 43 are women and 56 are men. Altogether 80 papers were presented, 76 in poster form and four by oral presentation. In addition, nineteen students have already obtained the double degree of bachelor’s degree and doctorate and continued on their way. But, the most important of all are not the numbers, which are impressive in themselves, but the scientific atmosphere that was breathed in the congress. Dozens of young people presenting and discussing with interest the work of their colleagues, with very varied topics, from basic science in subjects such as biochemistry or pharmacology, to population research sciences such as epidemiology, going through a diversity of clinical research works in multiple medical specialties.
The program has been a success so far. Within a few years we will have produced a hundred clinical researchers, plus those who will be on the way then. This pleasant experience adds to the previous Sunday’s University report that once again positions the UNAM School of Medicine as number one in this complex career. A goya for the success of PECEM!