FORT SMITH -- Arkansas Colleges of Health Education has signed a memorandum of understanding with Jaseng Hospital of Korean Medicine in Seoul, South Korea.
The memorandum will connect the college's educational institutions with the hospital to provide cultural learning exchanges between the institution's first college, Arkansas College of Osteopathic Medicine, and Jaseng Hospital physicians, according to a news release. The relationship was created under the direction of Arkansas Colleges of Health Education President Brian G. Kim, who was also born in South Korea.
"As ARCOM [Arkansas College of Osteopathic Medicine] develops its osteopathic medical education curriculum for students to practice locally, we want them to have not only national, but global perspective for patient care," Kim said in the news release. "It will broaden our students' abilities to approach their patients with mind, body, and spirit medicine which will ultimately help us fulfill our mission to educate competent, caring, and compassionate physicians to practice in Arkansas."
Arkansas College of Osteopathic Medicine intends to have a select group of students to complete an anticipated two-week clinical rotation in Seoul studying non-traditional, non-western medical techniques practiced at Jaseng Hospital, according to the release. Students who have completed their first year of medical school will shadow and observe while students in their third- and fourth-year rotations will have the opportunity to work alongside the Jaseng physicians.
In addition, the news release stated Arkansas College of Osteopathic Medicine faculty will present lectures while in Asia and Jaseng physicians will present their research and techniques in lectures in Arkansas. The first planned trip for Arkansas College of Osteopathic Medicine students is tentatively planned for June. Kim said it all depends on fundraising.
"Raising the funds which will allow these students to live in South Korea and study the techniques being used at Jaseng is a priority for me," Kim said. "We want our students to look at more than just conventional approaches, and this opportunity presents our students with another tool in their medical bag, with a broader depth of experience that they will translate into a more compassionate approach to serving the underserved."
Susan Devero, Arkansas Colleges of Health Education executive director of communications and community relations, said via email that Arkansas Colleges of Health Education currently has 69 clinical affiliation agreements, which are actual signed contracts for a hospital to take its students for their third and fourth year of medical school clinical training.
State Desk on 11/14/2019