THE National Universities Commission (NUC) has developed new Benchmark Minimum Academic Standards for training of doctors in universities with medical programme now extended to seven years duration. Executive Secretary of NUC, Professor Julius Okojie, presented the reviewed curriculum to the stakeholders at a three-day capacity development programme for staff of medical schools in Nigerian universities.

He said the new benchmark minimum academic standard was competency-based and would substantially address most of the challenges faced the institutions in the training of doctors in the country. Okojie noted that those that people trust their lives must be adequately trained and competent to discharge their responsibilities efficiently.

He said the workshop was to enable the stakeholders brainstorm as well as fine- tune the draft document. The curriculum review was necessitated by the fact that the frontier of knowledge in all academic disciplines had been advancing with new information generated as a result of research. Other compelling reasons included the need to update the standard and relevance of university education in the country as well as to integrate entrepreneurial studies as essential new platforms that would guarantee all graduates from Nigerian universities the knowledge of appropriate skills, competences and dispositions that would make them globally competitive and capable of contributing meaningfully to Nigeria’s socio-economic development.

Okojie said: "We must built some good quality hospitals and make facilities available for the students who are coming out with competences and skills to work. No doctor would want to work without equipment. "We are trying to look at it from holistic view. Good learning and teaching environment; good medical centres and the management of resources itself," he said.