Asia Pacific Medical Education Conference 2016

Trends • Issues • Priorities • Strategies

In December 2003, the Medical Education Unit (renamed the Centre for Medical Education, CenMED in November 2014), faculty of medicine (renamed the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine since 2005), National University of Singapore organised and hosted the 1st Asia Pacific Medical Education Conference (APMEC) under the co-chairmanship of Lee Tzu Hee (then Associate Professor in the department of haematology) and Matthew CE Gwee (then Interim Director of our MEU and Professorial Fellow in the department of pharmacology). Not only was this inaugural conference an important milestone in the history of our faculty of medicine (Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine), but it was also a significant initiative resulting in the birth of APMEC which became the forerunner of our APMEC series. The 13th APMEC was held from 13 – 17 January 2016 on the NUS campus in the tradition of previous conferences.

The primary aim of initiating the APMEC series was, firstly, to promote our medical school as a centre of excellence in medical education in Asia and beyond, as well as to provide a forum for and encourage all medical educators to update their knowledge and practice in the field of medical education which was undergoing rapid change and causing much disruption in teaching practices and the delivery of healthcare. It was in this context that the MEU launched the APMEC initiative; the principle we adopted was “THINK BIG, start small, Act Now”. Indeed, we had humble beginnings with only over just 100 participants in our first conference, but we now have almost 1,100 participants from 35 countries! Perhaps, we can now make the claim that our APMEC series is the premium medical education conference in Asia!

How can we explain the surge of interest in and the popularity of our APMEC series over the years? We would like to attribute this to our sincere concern that conference participants should benefit from the learning experience in the course of participating in all our conferences. Since 2003, the Organising Committee of APMEC will select an appropriate theme in medical (and health professions) education for the conference; we then invite key international speakers to review current trends, issues, priorities and strategies based on the selected theme. In this way, our conference participants benefit from the sharing of expertise, experience and wisdom of our invited speakers to whom we owe a debt of gratitude. The reviews by the international experts provide useful guidance on current topics in medical and health professional education which have important bearing, not only on teaching practices, but also in the delivery of healthcare. Apart from the key invited speakers, conference participants also benefit from discussions in various formats (e.g. Special Interest Groups) with lead participation from Asian medical educators, as well as educators from countries beyond the Asian region. Of course, no conference can succeed without the firm support of conference participants to whom we are most grateful and wish to express our sincere appreciation to.

Themes which the Organising Committees of the APMEC series have selected over the years include the following: Changing Paradigms (2003), Assessment TIPS (2004), Curriculum TIPS (2006), Outcomes in Medical Education (2007), Medical Education in a Flat World (2008), Energising the Educational Mission of Medical Schools (2009), Excellence in Medical Education-Quality in Healthcare (2010), Continuum of Medical Education: From Undergraduate Learning to Professional Practice (2011), Towards Transformative Education for Healthcare Professionals in the 21st Century: Nurturing Lifelong Habits of Mind, Behaviour and Action (2012), A Celebration of Innovation and Scholarship in M1dical and Health Professional Education (2013), Optimising Collaboration in Medical Education – Building Bridges, Connecting Minds (2014), Enhancing Faculty Development at the Workplace- From Theory to Practice (2015), Education To Healthcare – Contextualising Learning Into Practice (2016).

In 2015, our 12th APMEC was jointly organised with the 3rd International Conference on Faculty Development in the Health Professions (ICFDHP). The highlight of this joint activity was in the formulation of the terms and conditions for the award of Excellence in Faculty Development to medical schools around the world. The award is made under the Aspire to Excellence programme of the Association for Medical Education in Europe. Most notably, Professor David Irby from the University of California (San Francisco) skilfully led the discussions to finalise various options offered by members of the group.

Like all other conferences and for the benefit of our conference participants, we also include pre-conference workshops in our programme. We wish to highlight, in particular, the Essential Skills in Medical Education workshop conducted by Professor Ronald M Harden together with some local faculty as group facilitators. Due to its popularity and educational value, the workshop series was extended to include research skills (RESME) and assessment strategies and skills (ESMEA). These workshops are highly popular with conference participants and, often, attract a ‘full-house’ before the closing date for the conference, presumably, because of the possibility of adapting and applying the concepts and principles learned at these workshops to the ‘home’ situation.

A key feature of our APMEC series is the presentation of the MILES Award; MILES simply stands for ‘Mentorship, Innovation and Leadership in Educational Scholarship’. The award is given to educators who are recognised internationally as leaders in the field of medical education and/or who have contributed significantly to the progress of our APMEC series. No award will be made if no suitable candidate is identified in the year under consideration. Since the inception of the award in 2003, the following have received the MILES Award:

It has been a long and arduous journey for many in MEU-CenMED and we owe much of our success to the hard work and dedication of everyone in the organisation who strongly believe in what they do. Indeed we ‘THOUGHT BIG started small and Acted Then’ – long may APMEC flourish!