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| Original News Release |
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| Original News Release |
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· Between 1980 and 2001, no growth took place in the province’s 120 medical training spaces. During this same time there was a 50 per cent growth in provincial population, which made it difficult for B.C. residents to access the services of doctors in rural regions of the province, particularly in the North.
· In March 2002, government announced that the University of British Columbia’s medical school would be expanded to produce more B.C.-trained doctors to help reduce regional shortages. In a unique collaboration, UBC worked with the University of Northern British Columbia and the University of Victoria to form a distributed learning model that allows training to take place in three different geographic regions.
· Expanded medical training involves Vancouver/Fraser-based, Victoria-based and Prince George-based programs that will almost double the number of UBC’s first-year medical school spaces from the current 128 spaces to 224 by 2005-06.
· Beginning in September 2004, 200 medical students started their first semester at UBC’s Vancouver campus.
· In January 2005, 24 students will move from UBC to the northern medical program at UNBC and 24 will move to the Island medical program at UVic.
· By 2008-09, the northern medical program and Island medical program will have 96 spaces each and the Vancouver/Fraser program will have 704 spaces, which combined will be able to produce 224 graduates annually.
NEW MEDICAL EDUCATION FACILITIES
· Government committed $134 million in capital funding to build the facilities to accommodate the new training spaces and equip them with the technology to support the distributed learning model. This investment includes $110 million towards a new Life Sciences Centre at UBC’s Vancouver campus, and about $12 million each for the Northern Health Sciences Centre at UNBC and the Medical Sciences Centre at UVic.
Life Sciences Centre – University of B.C. (Vancouver)
· The Life Sciences Centre, at 51,000 square metres, is UBC’s largest building. About 40,000 square metres of that space is dedicated to the faculty of medicine, serving as the central hub of the distributed medical education program. The remainder accommodates teaching and research space for the study of life sciences.
· The centre contains two 50 by 18-metre lecture theatres large enough for 350 students each; 37 small, problem-based learning rooms; and flexible and high-use teaching labs, which will allow the expanded medical education program to be offered more efficiently.
· Lecture theatres and classrooms are equipped with sophisticated and flexible audiovisual and e-learning capabilities that allow for interactive and simultaneous learning at all three universities in the geographically distributed program.
· The multi-purpose lab, where up to 256 students at a time can be instructed in histology, neuroanatomy, physiology and pathology, has one computer for every two students showing coloured images of tissue. Students also have tissue assigned to them and do “wet” lab work as they receive instruction on their screen. Images projected from this area will be used simultaneously in the other medical school facilities at UVic and UNBC.
· The Life Sciences Centre was built in roughly half the time it would usually take for a building of this size and complexity. Through a fast-track process, with construction and planning taking place simultaneously, it was completed in 32 months, rather than five to six years.
· The construction budget was about 40 per cent less than the North American average, in part due to the use of generic lab spaces repeated throughout the centre, which created economies of scale and flexibility for varied research.
· The building’s energy-efficient design will save about $1 million in energy costs every five years, or 5.5 million kilowatt hours every year. It has attained silver certification in the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design rating system, and may qualify for the gold level.
Medical Sciences Building – University of Victoria
· The Medical Sciences Building at UVic will house the Island medical program. The building is 4,000 square metres and features two lecture theatres, a conference room, anatomy lab and multi-purpose lab that can be connected electronically through distributed learning technology to the other medical school facilities at UBC and UNBC.
Northern Health Sciences Centre – University of Northern B.C.
· The Northern Health Sciences Centre at UNBC will house the northern medical program. The building is 4,000 square metres and features lab space, eight classrooms for group problem-based learning, and two lecture theatres with state-of-the-art videoconferencing capability.
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