Submitted by Lemuel

The University of the West Indies (UWI) was established in 1948. Currently, it has full campuses in Jamaica, Trinidad and Barbados. The Mona Medical Faculty started in 1948 with 33 students. To date, the UWI has produced over 7,000 medical graduates. In 2008, the Cave Hill Campus took the bold step to establish a full faculty of medical sciences.

History

The UWI took over from Codrington College, which was the only institution that offered higher education at the degree level by 1953. Degrees in the Classics, Humanities and Theology were offered. All of this was done in affiliation with Durham University. However, it should be noted that the primary intent of the Codrington Will was to ensure that the College would have offered medical degrees. It is not clear why that was not done.

Therefore, any Caribbean national seeking medical education had to journey to Canada, the UK and the US. By September 1946, with an affiliation with the University of London, a medical school was set up in Mona, Jamaica. Over 600 students applied for entry, but only 33 were accepted after enduring a “special entrance examination” and interviews.

By the 1960s, although UWI had expanded the medical school to accommodate more entrants, a large number of its graduates did not remain in the Caribbean. For example, in the Class of 1969 (Professor Henry Fraser’s Class) 50% went to the US to do their internship and most of them never returned.

By 1967, Trinidad expanded its capacity and the St. Augustine Campus emerged. This expansion also allowed further access to medical training by Caribbean applicants. However, the St. Augustine Campus was not allowed to expand into a full medical faculty. Barbados followed suit, and the Mona Campus then expanded its capacity to increase its student numbers. Because the Trinidad and Barbados medical schools did not have a full medical school status, it was agreed in 1974 that both Campuses would facilitate students to complete their 4^th and 5^th years.

So by 2008, the Cave Hill Campus only had a School of Clinical Medical Research, and it would have been 40 years that Cave Hill was facilitating the completion of the two finals years for medical students. All of this was accomplished at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital. The St. Augustine Campus also morphed into the Eric Williams Medical Sciences Complex by 1989.

Hence, in 2008 and after 40 years of providing facilities for the final 2 years, the Cave Hill Campus took what is now regarded as the bold step to morph into a full Faculty of Medical Sciences. The Government of Barbados approved the process and provided a Bds$ 25 million loan to accomplish the physical expansion.

A business plan was developed and produced by the University Business Office and Ernst and Young. The Business Plan projected that the medical school would funded by:

• The University Grants Committee,
• Tuition from private students,
• Endowments and donations, and
• The expansion of the existing student number from 40 or 50 to 100 in four or five years.

Reasons for the development of the full medical faculty at Cave Hill:

• The economic cost for student at Cave Hill was Bds$ 75, 000 a year. This cost was more than Mona or St. Augustine, and there were only 25 students per class.
• Students from the Eastern Caribbean were not applying.
• Only Barbadian student were registered.
• Mona and St. Augustine only accepted 1 in 5 or less applicants and were concentrating more on attracting international students.
• A huge demand from international students.
• By expanding, Cave Hill would be in a position to utilize its spare capacity and reduce its economic costs.
• More spaces for students from the Eastern Caribbean could be accommodated at Cave Hill.
• Both Mona and St. Augustine had expanded the intake to 200 annually.

Benefits

It was expected that the following benefits would have accrued:

• Lower economic costs from Bds $ 75, 000.00
• Expanded medical training places
• Improve Cave Hill’s reputation
• Improve the critical mass of faculty staff
• A full five year medical program
• Expanded post graduate medical training programs
• Development of a degree program in Biomedical science

I have provide the facts as detailed by the University of the West Indies Strategic Plan 2007 – 2012 and an article by Professor Henry Fraser, which was published in the West Indian Medical Journal in 2008.