Return to Main Menu

Program builds bridges between students The following article describes one of many poster presentations set for this year’s faculty convocation Aug. 22. The Catalyst will highlight some of the presentations on MUSC’s international clinical, educational and research opportunities and outreach. by Mary Helen Yarborough Public Relations Some men may retire and spend their days relishing in their past or accomplishments. A few, however, collect their life’s work and share it for the benefit of future generations. Because of Philippe Arnaud, M.D., Ph.D., two nations also are benefiting from his efforts and exchange program at MUSC.   When Arnaud retired as professor of microbiology and immunology at MUSC, he continued his pursuit of more worldly interests—those of bridging academic and cultural paths for young medical students in France to cross over to learn in American institutions.   His passion to improve the education of French medical students has resulted in an established multidisciplinary exchange program between MUSC and Claude Bernard University in Lyon, France. Claude Bernard University’s reputation was illuminated recently when its plastic surgeons performed the first face transplant. Arnaud received his medical degree from there, and he is giving back to his alma mater and to the students of both countries.   “I see two major advantages [to this program],” Arnaud said. “When people come to Charleston and spend a year, they are different. They know something else. They have experiences. It’s very positive,” he said.   On the other hand, “For the students who have language problems, the beginning is a little bit shaky,” Arnaud said. “Once they are adjusted to the American way of life, they end up at the top of their studies when they finish their exams.”   The exchange program, which is managed through the College of Medicine’s medical education office, is entering its sixth year, and because of its success, will likely be expanded.   Currently, the program is unilateral in that only French students come here. No MUSC students have yet gone to Lyon,  according to Jeffrey Wong, M.D., senior associate dean for medical education.   “I would love to see this program expanded,” said Wong, who became involved in the Lyon exchange program in 2005.  Wong has traveled to Lyon and is quite interested in broadening the university’s international connections. He said MUSC plans to send a student to France next spring.   The program has provided five young French medical students with more practical, direct experience in medicine. The students, all of them young women, enter as second-year medical students here and return to France with advanced knowledge and more hands-on experience, said Arnaud, a board- certified endocrinologist specializing in genetics. The greater knowledge the French students gain here is not to suggest that French medical studies are inferior, their programs are just structured differently. French medical students also do not benefit from four years of undergraduate studies as a prerequisite for entering medical school as they would in America.   “In France, a student goes straight to medical school [from what is equivalent to American high school],” Wong explained. “They do not have the four years of undergraduate school like ours, and the structure is not the same.”   French medical schools also require at least eight years of medical training, as opposed to a base four years in the United States, not counting the additional years American students spend specializing or certifying in a particular field. The French add to these eight years if they want to specialize, up to six years, Arnaud explained. MUSC will accept only students who have at least three years of medical school in France, because it is the year where both programs actually have much in common, said Arnaud. The student must also be fluent in English.   While the program has focused on COM studies, Wong said that MUSC is hosting for the first time a dental student, Amine Baroud, who also is the first male student in the program. MUSC now is contemplating an exchange involving students from the colleges of pharmacy in both countries.   Wong said he is hopeful the program will become bilateral and that some of MUSC’s students would agree to conduct a rotation at Lyon. For now, the program in the COM is expanding to accept two students a year, as opposed to one. Dental differences Amine Baroud, the dental “test pilot” for the MUSC program, is the only male so far. He returns to France in late August after two months of study and research at MUSC.   “My story began two years ago when I decided I wanted to come to America for dental studies,” Baroud said. “I contacted the universities and I was introduced to MUSC.”   He sought help from his professor, Doury Jacques, dean of the international relations office and vice dean of the university in Lyon, and honorary dean of the dental faculty for assistance. The results for Baroud were opened doors to MUSC where the dental faculty signed on to what has become a  pilot. “I am doing my thesis, a research study of 250 pages on the two countries, cities, universities, dental faculties, dental education and general education, a guide to help my French followers, a research to get students interested in going to Lyon,” said Baroud.   Baroud said he has enjoyed his experience here, but has noted differences between the two countries’ systems. “[While] the lectures and the theory are the same between Lyon and MUSC, the Americans are not keen on   international standards,” said Baroud, citing as an example the American aversion to the metric system. “Everything here is in inches and feet, gallons and pounds, it’s disrupting at first, but you get used to it.”   In addition, at Lyon, Baroud said that French students experience more clinical training than at MUSC mainly due to the fact that there is a larger population in Lyon than Charleston, and that the French have six years of dental experience instead of four and that the treatments are free. Because of this, he said he believes that French students may be more experienced in handling a variety of conditions when they graduate and that the MUSC dental students will return from Lyon much stronger in clinical practice. His studies indicated that the most appropriate time would be at the end of the junior year. He also noted that the American studies are very specialized.  “In France, there is no official specialty besides orthodontics,” Baroud said.   But he also has experienced life and grown to understand Americans more.   “I have a view of student life here,” he said. “We have a group of seven or eight students who get together. We have good times, especially in the post-gross anatomy parties and on ‘Metal Monday' …I know that people here are more open-minded, and friendlier than what I was led to expect in France. I have met two students here who are really interested in going to France.” Cultural incubation What prompted Arnaud to develop this program is the difference between the French and American medical teaching systems.   “The teaching in this country is much better,” said Arnaud, who came to MUSC in 1975, and also studied with Maxine Singer, Ph.D., at the National Institutes of Health. “It is better here because of the relationship between the student and teacher. In France, there is not the same interaction between the student and teacher. Here, [the professor] takes the hand of the student and works very closely with that student for a year. This is extremely helpful. …All of the French medical students love the way they do it in this system.”   Arnaud, who often hosts the students until they find their own place, said students who come to Charleston return to France with greater enthusiasm for their chosen fields.     Friday, Aug. 18, 2006 Catalyst Online is published weekly, updated as needed and improved from time to time by the MUSC Office of Public Relations for the faculty, employees and students of the Medical University of South Carolina. Catalyst Online editor, Kim Draughn, can be reached at 792-4107 or by email, catalyst@musc.edu. Editorial copy can be submitted to Catalyst Online and to The Catalyst in print by fax, 792-6723, or by email to catalyst@musc.edu. To place an ad in The Catalyst hardcopy, call Island Publications at 849-1778, ext. 201.