www.EJME.org

BACKGROUND

From the beginnings of the civilization in the late fourth millennium BC, Egyptian medical practice was highly advanced for its time, including simple surgery, setting of bones, dentistry, and an extensive set of pharmacopoeia. Egyptian medical thought influenced later traditions, including the Greek’s [1]. The modern history of Egyptian medical education begins in 1827, when Kasr Al-Ainy was established as a military teaching hospital in Abu Zaabal, to the northeast of Cairo [2]. The second medical school was established 115 years later, in 1942, at Alexandria; the third, Ain Shams, in 1947, and the fourth, in Assiut, in 1960. Since then, other medical schools have been established, mostly dependent on those first four schools for faculty and curricula [3].

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During the last decade, modern global trends in Medical Education have found their way gradually to the Egyptian medical schools with the establishment of dedicated departments in many of the Egyptian Universities nationwide. Changes in the way that lectures are delivered, increasing use of independent learning, and increasing use of online teaching tools have provided the medical students with a wide array of information sources to supplement and expand their education. Individualized courses only delivering information in the specific subset area of medicine should be now a thing of the past. More correlations, both clinical and nonclinical between the various courses should be presented.

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As we progress into the future, there will be a seamless basic science and clinical curricula, where courses are identified based more on topic areas across basic and clinical perspectives, rather than the individual sciences as taught as in years to past [4].

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The first anatomy lesson at the teaching hospital in Abu Zaabal, Cairo in 1827 [5]

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LEADING THE FUTURE

 

On behalf of the Editorial Board, I am delighted to announce the publication of the inaugural issue of The Egyptian Journal of Medical Education (EJME), a new online, international, open-access, peer-reviewed, journal on all aspects of undergraduate, postgraduate and continuing Medical Education.

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EJME seeks to be a venue by which educators across all disciplines can publish methods, reports, and reviews on all areas of medical education, being basic science or clinically related. New concepts and curriculum design changes are encouraged to be published. New ideas to engage and assess students in active learning, team-based learning and problem-based learning are encouraged to be presented. Clinical curriculum changes are also vital to the advancement of medical education and with respect to this, we encourage publication of articles related to new offerings of clinical clerkships, models of patient simulation, and related methods with which students learn more effectively.

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EJME actively encourages individuals in all areas of medical education to submit materials for review for publication in any of the areas outlined in the aims and scope of our Journal. We look forward to making this journal one of the best journals related to medical education, with high visibility, and high impact, not only on basic science medical education, but also on clinical education for many years to come. With our open access format and free publication process, we can ensure not only the rapid publication of timely reports on medical education and curricular development, but also the worldwide rapid readership of these new curricular changes, and ideas that impact medical education in Egypt and around the world.

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It is exciting to start a new journal from scratch. With the opportunity to cast off some of the accepted norms of the Egyptian journals publishing, we were able to rethink our whole approach and also address some of the on-going challenges Egyptian journals face. One such challenge is the diversity of our Editorial Board. We were keen to recruit a board that represents the full range of Medical Education researchers, including early career researchers. During the selection process we kept in mind various factors such as gender, geographic location and career stage, and the result has been an enthusiastic and supportive group covering a range of disciplines and profiles.

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In EJME, we are committed to a speedy and rational reviewing process for every piece of scholarship submitted to us. We endeavor to reply to all papers submitted within four weeks’ time with an answer about acceptance or rejection. We also do not require formatting for submissions in our style until after the paper has been accepted for publication.

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Finally, we hope that the launch of EJME will crown the marvelous efforts to develop and upgrade the Medical Education programs among the Egyptian medical schools and worldwide.