Medical admission based on Literature score causes mixed reactions

Some schools include Literature in medical admissions because doctors need to be able to express themselves and empathize with patients, but doctors say using Literature scores is inappropriate.

Of the 27 universities that train in Medicine in Vietnam, four schools use a combination of Literature subjects for admission, including Van Lang, Duy Tan (Da Nang), Vo Truong Toan in Hau Giang and Tan Tao in Long An .

Dr. Vo Thanh Hai, Permanent Vice President of Duy Tan University, said that the school will include Literature in the admissions group for the Medical major from 2022, after consulting with employers and training experience.

According to Mr. Hai, hospital leaders hope to recruit doctors who are not only good at their profession but also sympathetic and understanding towards patients. This is also the need of people when they go to the hospital for medical examination and treatment.

The school identified two important subjects for the medical profession: Mathematics and Biology. But instead of just taking the Biology score, the school used the Natural Science exam which included Biology, Chemistry, and Physics. Then, the school added Literature to the combination.

"Literature is a person. People who are good at literature are often sympathetic, sharing and compassionate. I think the combination of Mathematics, Natural Sciences and Literature assesses the candidate's ability quite comprehensively," he said.

The school's Nursing Department previously recruited students using three combinations including Literature. Graduates were evaluated by employers as suitable, quick to adapt, and good at completing their work, according to Mr. Hai.

Students of the Faculty of Medicine, Vo Truong Toan University, do an internship at Can Tho Obstetrics and Gynecology Hospital, 2020. Photo: VTTU

Dr. Nguyen Hung Vi, Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Van Lang University, explained that the reason for recruiting based on Literature scores is because society has increasingly high demands on doctors, in addition to expertise, they need to have a good attitude, the ability to listen and share. Therefore, they need to have communication skills to create trust for patients.

"The qualities of a good Literature student are essential for this job," said Mr. Vi.

The Law on Higher Education allows schools to decide and be responsible for their own admissions. According to the Regulations of the Ministry of Education and Training, schools can choose their own subjects in the admission combination, as long as each combination has a maximum of three exams, including Math or Literature.

In 2014, the Minister of Health responded to the proposal of some medical and pharmaceutical principals to include Literature in the admissions process. Health sector leaders at that time believed that Literature helps cadres speak fluently, express their writing clearly and grammatically.

Associate Professor, Dr. Dau Xuan Canh, Chairman of the Vietnam Oriental Medicine Association, former Director of the Academy of Traditional Medicine, commented that if the consulting, explaining, and communication skills of some medical staff are limited, it will cause misunderstandings, making the relationship between patients and doctors unfriendly.

"From this perspective, including Literature in the entrance exam is somewhat appropriate," said Mr. Canh.

However, many doctors or medical lecturers object, worrying that the choice of Literature subject is only to serve the admission strategy and competition between schools.

A lecturer at a medical school in Ho Chi Minh City analyzed that if they only recruit based on traditional combinations such as Math-Chemistry-Biology or Math-Physics-Chemistry, schools will have to compete fiercely with famous training institutions. The entrance threshold for the medical industry according to the combination of three subjects is usually from 22 graduation exam points or 24 points of academic transcript or higher. When candidates with high scores have entered major medical schools, if they still consider the two combinations above, private schools will have difficulty attracting candidates.

"When offering a separate combination, a single horse, schools can easily recruit more," he commented.

'Not good at literature, don't you love people'

Doctor Truong Huu Khanh, former Head of the Department of Infectious Diseases and Neurology, Children's Hospital I, Ho Chi Minh City, believes that the most important qualities of a medical student are accuracy and logic, in addition to a good foundation of Biology knowledge.

Sharing the same view, a general practitioner, a former student of Hanoi Medical University, said that Medicine is a science that requires high precision, so the first condition is to have good knowledge of natural sciences.

"It's not true that only those who are good at literature can analyze and explain well," he said, adding that communication is a soft skill that everyone in any profession must cultivate, not just medicine.

On the other hand, Dr. Khanh believes that compassion and sharing are the results of a long-term educational process from school, family, and society, not that those who are good at literature are more compassionate.

"Doctors who were not good at literature in the past could not care about people," said Mr. Khanh, who advised tens of thousands of people during the Covid pandemic in Ho Chi Minh City.

A former student of Hanoi Medical University said that if they want to diversify the admission combinations, schools can create new combinations, such as Physics-Chemistry-Biology, Biology-Chemistry-English, which are more suitable to assess the ability of candidates in the medical field.

According to Mr. Canh, schools need to harmonize interests by leaving a very small percentage of quotas based on the combination of subjects including Literature in the first years. If schools reserve large quotas, it can cause confusion, affect candidates and cause bad public opinion.

In fact, in the first year Duy Tan University recruited students for the Medicine program with a combination of Literature subjects, less than 10 candidates were admitted according to this combination. The reason, according to the school's leaders, was that it was difficult for students to get high scores in Literature when they had studied mainly natural sciences.

Le Nguyen - Duong Tam

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