THE Chinese Medical Brigade has completed specialised training for 13 doctors who have now graduated.

The Resident Training Programme, an initiative between the Ministry of Health and the People’s Republic of China, has produced a second set of graduates.

On Tuesday, the ceremony of the Guyana Resident Training Programme was held at the Ministry of Health, on Brickdam.

Ms. Guo Haiyan, Chinese Ambassador to Guyana, and Dr. Frank Anthony, Minister of Health, attended the ceremony, along with Li Hanqing, Counselor of the Commercial and Economic Office of the Chinese Embassy, members of the 18th Chinese Medical Brigade, and students.

At the beginning of the ceremony, Chu Xuehui, the captain of the medical brigade, congratulated all the trainees on their successful graduation.

According to him, in the last six months of training, trainees excelled in training content, significantly improved their clinical diagnosis and treatment skills, and formed strong bonds with medical team members. The medical team is committed to promoting standardised training in a broader and higher direction, and making continuous efforts to improve medical care in Guyana.

Ambassador Guo Haiyan said that this year marks the 30th Anniversary of the dispatch of the medical team to Guyana. Over the past 30 years, the medical teams have always taken clinical teaching and skill training as one of the key points of medical service.

Following the arrival of the 18th medical team in Guyana, a second round of advanced standardised training for residents was implemented, based on the previous programme, aimed at further improving their medical skills.

“Now Guyana is facing huge opportunity for economic and social development, and the demand for high quality medical services increase sharply. China is willing to take this opportunity to make joint efforts with Guyana to promote bilateral cooperation, collaboration in various fields, including health sector and continuously contribute to the high-quality development of Guyana’s HealthServices,” the Chinese Ambassador stated.

Ambassador Guo also thanked Minister Anthony for his support and assistance to the medical team, saying that she looks forward to in-depth cooperation in the health sector between the two countries and promoting the construction of a China-Guyana health community.

Minister of Health Dr. Frank Anthony noted that the training is a priority of government as the health sector expands with the construction and upgrade of new and existing health facilities across the country.

“We see a lot of importance in getting more people trained, so it’s not just good enough for us to have medical doctors that are with their undergraduate and coming in and not doing specialised training, because if we are going to offer high quality healthcare, we need to upgrade training and so we have been actively seeking various avenues for this kind of training and I think we have found a very good and reliable partner with the government and people of China,” Dr. Anthony stated.

The minister said an agreement will soon be signed to send doctors to pursue postgraduate training in China.

Guyana has also benefitted in several other ways from the partnership between the two countries, including donation of equipment and the establishment of several new medical centres, which will soon come on stream.

Minister Anthony noted that with all the infrastructural developments taking place in the health sector, like the construction of 12 new hospitals and other upgrades to existing facilities, more medical personnel are needed.

“In all of these hospitals we will need persons with additional skills, we want to maintain in each of these hospitals,12-hour accident and emergency service, we want to have a good surgical service, where we will have two operating theatres, we want to have orthopedic service, we want to provide paediatric service [and] internal medicine. For all of this we need more people and we need people who will be going out to take on responsibilities in these hospitals.

He thanked the 18th medical team for their unremitting efforts in the training of Guyanese doctors, which has deepened the exchanges and friendship between the two countries in the field of health care through technical teaching.