Medical graduate school opens in Limerick

THE country’s first standalone graduate medical school at the University of Limerick opened its doors to 32 late-vocation-aspiring doctors this week.

The four-year medical programme was open to graduates with an honours degree in any discipline.

Those who arrived for the first of their classes have undergraduate degrees in areas as diverse as mechanical engineering, law, English and French. All of the students are from Ireland, bar one who is from Canada.

Earlier this year, the university was nominated by the Department of Education as the lead graduate entry school of medicine in the country, securing 108 of the 240 places that will be available from 2010.

The other places have been divided among existing medical faculties at other colleges.

The school will operate from temporary premises until a €16 million medical school is completed on campus in 2009.

The students will be taught all of the basic medical and clinical sciences necessary as the basis for their postgraduate training and for a career in medicine.

The course will also be the shortest available in the country, lasting four years.

Students will spend the first two years on campus and will then spend a further two in the affiliated hospitals. Six months of the final two years of clinical practice will be provided in general practice primary care and this is being facilitated through the establishment of primary care teaching networks in the mid-west, midlands and the south-east.

Founding director of the graduate school Professor Paul Finucane said the school’s innovative curriculum defined the university’s pioneering approach to medical education.

“Our first students will become pioneers of a new age in medical education in Ireland,” said Prof Finucane yesterday.

And students attending the school have already received their first problem-based medical case involving a patient with hearing difficulties. While working towards a possible prognosis students will be learning about the anatomy of the ear, normal mechanisms of hearing and hearing impairment.

Irish students attending the college will pay an annual fee of €12,000 with the balance of €13,000 paid by the state.

The Medical Council, which has granted provisional accreditation for the university’s graduate entry programme, will be monitoring its delivery.