Dr. Kai, a Thai doctor of a university hospital, gave some comments after having known that "our university" is not ranked in the 200-top list in 2004, focussing on why university doctors have fewer publications than scientists do, and his view for resolving the problems. (Dr. Kai is still at UCL, UK for his training in neuromuscular diseases.)
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I think that's because they (scientists, pdharma's editing) do not have exhuasted clinical service job to do ( I mean they have more time to concentrate on research without doing more boring administrative and clinical job and that's because the basis of work structure is different between the faculty) and they have many PhD or MSc students and teams like a man have 10 limbs to help their projects. Like Queen Square, the good quality research publication is run by PhD students and postdocs as it's a pre-requisite for futher SpR (Specialist Registrar. pdharmas's editing) training and the academic lecturer staff concentrates on research only and service is mostly run by hospital clinical staff. And they are co-operative with each other well. Unlike in thailand, they are just competitive among the others and lack of co-operation and everyone want to be the first author because the system of academic promotion is just score on the first author. For example, Fac of Science and Rama are not cooperative well in doing co-research and you have mentioned before Fac of Science sometimes feel that Rama just use fac of science as a techician! In my opinion, research that could be applied in clinical use or can answer to clinical problem (the clinician know this question but need some basic research support) are worth to do. Not just the research that scientists just want to do to fulfil their satisfaction and the result is just kept on the shelf and cannot apply like many theses of Mahidol. How many of them are referred to and used in practice. Only some of the trop med that are useful esp Malaria and tropical disease. But in the future, I think the trend will be like in Queen Square as there will be more clinician-scientist (2 in one), this basic + clinical research needed will be less problem.
I have raised the policy of dividing staff physician into research-oriented team ( for those who favorite and keen on doing research but do not like teaching or service), and clinical service with teaching oriented (for those who do like teaching and see the patient) and of course the criteria of positional promotion must be totally different criteria. This will booster the research publication.Only researchers will concentrate the research all days and do not worry about the service. But it's impossibles as Rama want 3 in one policy : good teacher, good service and good researcher at the same time so nothing is excellent in each item. I believe a guy can do the best job if that job is his favourite and he has time to concentrate on and under the appropriate circumstance without any distracting factors. Different person has different ability to do his different job.
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It does not mean that I (pdharmas) agree with all of Dr. Kai's comments. My point is that we have to learn from different ideas in order to understand the real problems that might be a blockage for cooperation in the future. I do know that most of our senior staff realize and know about the problems very well and have been trying so hard to improve the situation. Please click comments to see pdharmas's.
2 comments:
#1
It's acceptable that senior professors have their students and postdocs for doing experiments. This's the way it should be.
For young staff, our university has grants for them to start their own research in coorperation with or under supports of senior staff. University hospitals also have grants for this purpose, maybe more than other faculty do.
Not only do clinicians who usually complain, having no enough time to do research, scientists also have the same problem. Not only the administrative duties, but also teaching. Not teaching only medical students, but also para-med, MSc, PhD students. Not only teaching in the rooms, but also in the labs such as the anatomy lab, histology lab, embryology lab and so on. Not only the labs at Phayathai, but also at Salaya where we have to go there by bus.
#2
There are other fields of research that our Fac of Science has to pay attention, not just reseacrh in medical sciences. And I do not think we compete with each other. In contrast, we have been trying to coorperate. The "Center of Excellence" is an example. For example, "Contex Shrimp" is a multidisciplinary laboratory by amalgamation of research laboratories from the Departments of Anatomy, Biochemistry and Biotechnology.
Other centers in the Center of Excellence are also important and useful for Thailand, eg., Center for Vectors and Vector-Borne Diseases, Center for Natural Rubber Research, Center of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology Research Unit, and Center for Bioinformatics and Applied Genomics Research Unit. Their works are not on the shelf at all. Please visit www.sc.mahidol.ac.th/subcontentresearch.htm for more information.
For my department, I never feel that we compete each other. We in fact try to coorperate with each other. Good environment and good relationship are the key for every department for having a good coorperation. Each staff should have this duty.
#3
The policy Dr. Kai has raised is reasonable. However, in my opinion, service and research cannot be totally isolated from each other. While a doctor examines his/her patients in OPD, he/she also does clinical research in the same time. I mean service is also a part of research, if doctors have critical thinking, and they can make papers for publication from their service.
I am being interested in Dr.Kai's idea about the new criteria for academic position. Hope he would have time to write it in detail and allow me to post on this weblog again.
"Thai Doctor on World Class University Ranking" is informative for us. Thanks
regards, Infolx
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