Med-Camp 2014 to introduce Emirati high schoolers to medicine

Khalifa University students being trained for Med-Camp 2014. Here Shannen Medina, Lubna Abdul Nazar and Dalia Rashed examine Lubna’s hands under a lamp to see how much bacteria is on them. Lee Hoagland / The NationalShow less

ABU DHABI // Young Emiratis who aspire to work in the medical field will have a chance to get a hands-on introduction to the profession in the second annual Med-Camp hosted by Khalifa University.

Emirati pupils in grades 10 and 11 who are interested in health care can apply for the free, five-day camp that runs from August 3-7. A second session is being offered from August 17-21. Space on each is limited to 40 participants.

With the expected opening of the capital’s first medical school in September 2015, Dr Rashed Al Nuaimi, executive director of the college of medicine and health sciences initiative at Khalifa University, said he hoped participants in Med-Camp would be encouraged to pursue an education in medicine.

“That’s our target,” he said. “We try to recruit or to start to target the students from the ninth to the 11th grade high-school students, male and female, so when they come to enter university, they go for biomedical engineering.

“This is our target, for Khalifa University, that they will study four years of biomedical engineering and after that they will commit themselves for another four years for medical school.”

The medical school is expected to accommodate up to 3,000 students and 762 staff. It will be built at Khalifa University, increasing the campus in size from 34,500 square metres to 169,500 square metres. “We would like to attract the cream of the high schools,” Dr Al Nuaimi said.

“We hope this is the way that we can approach the society, to recruit more and to have more actually be on board in biomedical engineering, so that they will be the future doctors in Khalifa University studying medicine.”

The high-school pupils will be guided by Khalifa University student facilitators, who were themselves trained by medical professionals this week to conduct interactive camp activities and workshops. Healthcare professionals will visit the camp to give lectures about the nature of their jobs.

“We have doctors coming from different fields to talk to students, not only about their fields, but also about their experiences,” said Sarah Bawazir, 22, a camp organiser and facilitator.

“This time we have workshops on robotics, workshops on biology-related things like dissection, blood typing, a crime-scene investigation, sports medicine, things like this. When I was a high-school student, I really wish I had a camp like this to motivate me for science and to pursue a degree in medicine. I want to encourage students to attend the programme, even if they don’t like science, even if they think they want to do business or engineering or maths. Just attend, see it and then decide.”

Applications can be found at www.kustar.ac.ae/pages/medcamp-information and must be received by June 30.

The last time the camp was held, the university received nearly 300 applications, said Dr Al Nuaimi.