MEDICAL SCHOOL EXPANSION Clinical Training For 70 Students In Christchurch

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32361, 29 July 1970, Page 1

MEDICAL SCHOOL EXPANSION Clinical Training For 70 Students In Christchurch

“The Press” Special Service DUNEDIN, July 28. The University of Otago Council decided yesterday to prepare submissions to the University Grants Committee to build a clinical school that will eventually cater for 70 medical students at Christchurch Hospital.

The formal resolution yesterday was the result of a series of meetings between the university and the North Canterbury Hospital Board. The Chancellor of the university (Mr T. K. S. Sidey) said the resolution was the most important for many years. The chairman of the North Canterbury Hospital Board (Dr L. C. L. Averill) travelled to Dunedin for the meeting. He told th 1 ? council that his board was interested in the clinical

school, and was sure the school would be a strong adjunct to the Otago Medical School. The board plans a building of four or five storeys in the ' grounds of Christchurch Hos- : pital for the school. Some 50 fourth-year students will be : transferred to the school in < 1973, and 70 in the succeed- ’ ing year. i The Vice-Chancellor of the i university (Dr R. M. Williams) said it was obvious I that the school would need a : good deal of autonomy in its 1 administration, and a council i of some sort would be estab- i lished. i The clinical dean of the medical school (Professor R. I 0. H. Irvine) said there had 1 been some criticism of clint-1 cal schools recently, but he i had no doubt the concept; would result in a viable insti-1 tution which, in many re- s spects, would have advan-1 tages over a full-scale medical school. i There would be some disad-1 vantages, but he was sure i they would not be as great as the critics claimed they would. A significant move towards curing New Zealand’s doctor shortage was made by the university council today when it agreed to increase by French Nuclear Test. (N.Z. Press Association) PARIS, July 28. France exploded another nuclear device at its South Pacific test site yesterday, the Defence Department announced. The experimental low-power device test was held above the 1 lagoon of Mururoa Atoll, the department said. Such de-i vices are normally suspended' from a balloon. The blast was the sixth In; the test series in which; France is perfecting the pro-; duction version of its hydro-' gen bomb. Two more low-i power tests are expected. The blast was the twentieth j at the Pacific test site since France was forced to abandon' its Sahara testing ground. J

s two-thirds the intake of stu- ■ dents to the Otago Medical I School, the Press Association reports. > The council decided to tell ; the University Grants Com- . mittee that it was willing to I increase the intake to 200 a i year. The timing of the ini crease is to be arranged, but ■ the committee has asked the council if it could be i achieved earlier than 1976. • . The present intake is 120 ; students. An increase to 150 students in 1972 had been : planned previously in accordance with a recommendation of the Christie report on the medical school. The council today gave its approval on the condition that problems associated with the increase be solved. These include the provision of ; accommodation, staff and • facilities, and a place for the students to go at the end of ■ their third year. - In accordance with another recommendation of the • Christie report, there will be > no increase in the number of | . .

• fourth, fifth or sixth year I students at Otago. i A new clinical school at Wellington, like the one to I be built at Christchurch, ’ seemed to be the logical 1 destination for the students at the end of their third pre- ' clinical year, the ViceChancellor told the council. A letter has already been written to the Wellington Hospital Board seeking its opinion on the establishment of a clinical school in its area. Meanwhile, the Otago Medical School faced a crash building programme, he said. A preliminary survey showed that the building needed could be sited behind the surgery block. The grants committee had accepted that expansion of the school would require additional capital and recurrent grants. The committee had also recognised that early consideration would have to be given to a revision of accommodation at the school, he said.