Cooperation among countries can strengthen prevention and treatment capacity,patient treatment and care, and hospital management.
Cooperation with French partners is one of the highlights of the city’sinternational medical cooperation.
During the 50 years since the two countries established diplomatic relations,the French Cooperation Agency has supported training in postgraduate programmeslectured by French and Vietnamese professors and doctors who are lecturers atmedical universities in Hanoi, HCM City, Hue and Hai Phong.
In addition to providing medical treatment, a team of French and Vietnamesedoctors and nurses at the French Medical Centre in HCM City exchange and shareexperiences in various fields, especially in training human resources andfostering skilled doctors and nurses.
Emmanuelle Pavillon-Grosser, French Consul General to HCM City, said more than3,000 Vietnamese doctors and nurses have been sent to French hospitals fortraining and they are taking charge of management in universities and hospitalsin Vietnam.
“More and more young French people are studying in Vietnam,” she said.
The United States is also one of the countries with many important medicalcooperation projects with HCM City.
The US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention has coordinated withVietnamese medical workers to save the lives of many patients over the past 25years by providing prevention and treatment services for people living withHIV.
From 2013, the Vietnamese-German Faculty ofMedicine at the HCM City-based Pham Ngoc Thach University of Medicine hastrained medical students according to international standards.
This training programme is the first of its kind to train Vietnamese medicaldoctors following international standards and the first graduates can continuepursuing their postgraduate programmes while simultaneously practising medicinein Germany.
The university is also the first unit in Vietnam to have a training programmewhose quality is equivalent to the European level.
Nguyen Thanh Hiep, the university’s principal, said so far 70 excellent doctorshave graduated from the school, and 349 other students have enrolled in thisjoint training programme.
They will be the doctors of the ‘golden generation of medicine’ in the comingtime, he said.
“The training programme is a breakthrough in the field of training medicalworkers with high quality,” he said.
Tang Chi Thuong, Director of the municipal Department of Health, said the cityaims to become a healthcare centre in the ASEAN region.
“It is necessary to promote cooperation with medically advanced countries tohelp increase the health sector’s medical examination and treatment capacity,”he said.
That not only meets Vietnamese patients’ rising demand but also attractsforeign patients, contributing to raising the position of Vietnamesehealthcare, he said./.