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Mar 09, 2019 / 08:08

Vietnam, UK promote healthcare training cooperation

In order to achieve the goal of improving quality of human resource, Vietnam`s Ministry of Health will change the methodology of training and developing healthcare staff in the direction of approaching advanced countries’ methods, getting closer to the world’s healthcare system in general and the UK’s in particular.

The UK is willing to share experience in healthcare staff training, contributing to support Vietnam's healthcare sector in training well-qualified staff.

British Ambassador in Vietnam Gareth Ward made the statement at the workshop on UK-Vietnam healthcare education and training collaboration, co-organized by the British embassy and the Administration of Science Technology and Training and the Ministry of Health (MoH) in Hanoi on March 8.

According to the UK-based research firm BMI, Vietnam’s healthcare expenditure is forecasted to grow to US$22.7 billion in 2021, recording a compound annual growth rate of approximately 12.5% from 2017 to 2021. 
 
British Ambassador Gareth Ward makes speech at the event. Photo: Anh Kiet
British Ambassador Gareth Ward makes speech at the event. Photo: Anh Kiet
Ambassador Gareth Ward said economic growth and demographic changes are driving demand for improving healthcare services throughout Vietnam. In order to supplement the quality of healthcare services provision, human resources training for healthcare is an important factor that acts as a prerequisite for the quality and effectiveness of the health system. 

The ambassador added that the UK is internationally renowned for the quality of its medical education and training. The country is home to three of the world’s top five universities for clinical, pre-clinical and health subjects.

"As a global leader and having prestigious and cutting edge clinical training facilities, the UK is looking to forge long-term partnership with the MoH, local healthcare providers and educational institutions in Vietnam, and identify more opportunities to collaborate in the near future," he stressed.

For his part, Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Truong Son said that training healthcare staff is an important factor in improving service quality, care and people's health.

In recent years, healthcare training has achieved some important results, but many difficulties and challenges have arisen, requiring reasonable solutions for both immediate and long term, Son noted. 

 
An overview of the business-to-business meeting. Photo: Anh Kiet
A scene of the business-to-business meeting. Photo: Anh Kiet
However, he affirmed that the work of renewing the training of healthcare staff is a long process, requiring unified direction of management agencies as well as the active participation of the medical training system, including hospitals.

In addition, the deputy minister expressed his hope that there will be many innovations in healthcare education in Vietnam, in order to reach international standards, driven by the Higher Education Law. 

He added that so as to achieve the goal of improving quality of human resources, the MoH will change the methodology of training and developing healthcare staff in the direction of approaching advanced countries’ methods, getting closer to the world’s healthcare system in general and the UK’s in particular.

At the business-to-business meeting, a representative from Royal College of General Practitioners told Hanoitimes: “We would like to focus on showcasing the UK’s strengths and what we can offer to Vietnam. We want to share our international experience in promoting training quality of healthcare and aim to connect Vietnamese leaders, educators, healthcare players with our healthcare education.”

“We look forward to supporting Vietnam to obtain excellent healthcare workforce which has the right knowledge and skills to greatly contribute to providing excellent healthcare services to Vietnamese patients,” another representative from University of Dundee
told the reporter.