Current Situation Of TCM Acupuncture Clinical Education In Canada

Objective: To further understand the field of Traditional Chinese Medicine andAcupuncture in Canada. This paper is research based on an important component-Traditional Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture clinical education in Canada.This paperintroduces the Canadian TCM Acupuncture education origin, development, historybackground, and current situation. Also elaborates on legislation, professional organization,education curriculum, accreditation, and examination system. The paper further analysis theCanadian TCM and Acupuncture education on its character, achievements, maturity level,and what remains for further improvement.Methods:1. Information retrieval and literature：To research the organize informationand systemize of TCM and Acupuncture education during1970-2014. All the informationincluding: newspapers, journals, conference proceedings and websites.2. Literature analysis method：The relevant literature to classify, compares, analyzes andsummarize. Try to describe current situation and features education of TCM andAcupuncture in Canada. And discusses, research and deduction to understand education ofTCM and Acupuncture in Canada.Results and Conclusion: During the past few decades of historical development andtrajectory, the Canadian TCM and Acupuncture clinical education system developed instages: developing from its initial process stage during the80’s. The90’s was a period ofdevelopment expansion. Currently, it’s the rapid period of development for Schools. Duringthe process of development, considering the increase in the number of the schools, advancein teaching Standards, and increase in the amount of hours are indications.Canadian TCM educations are mostly distributed and concentrated in British Columbia,Ontario and Alberta. These three provinces are also the most active zone for acupuncturists.Legislation is to protect and promote the development of clinical education. Since thefirst acupuncture legislation taken place in1974, there are five other provinces becameregulated by legislation, estimate about88%of Canada’s total population. This means thatCanadian acupuncturists legislation is popularize, which provides existence and guaranteefor the Canada TCM and Acupuncture clinical education.The supervisory and administrative aspects of clinical education are carried out byFTCMCC, MTCU-PCC, and Pan-Canadian Examination. The FTCMCC establisheseducation policy and criteria. School Credential oversight is managed by MTCU-PCC. AndPan-Canada Examination is the executive administrator for practitioner certification. These three preceding organizations form a well-rounded credible structure for the Canadian TCMand Acupuncture clinical education system.Canadian TCM and Acupuncture clinical education objective is to train self-employedpractitioners to serve the community. The vast majority of graduates practices independently,few graduates employed by hospitals or medical centers. Traditional Chinese Medicine andAcupuncture are still few steps away from becoming the main stream of the medical field.Canadian National TCM practitioners and Acupuncture Registration Exam (Pan-Canadian Examination) provides70reference books, many of these books are Englishedition of the Chinese University text-book. Chinese education focus on outstandingtraditional Chinese medicine knowledge. In comparison, Canadian education also focus onFirst-aid, consultation, communication skills, medical ethics and medical management.The number of clinical hours in Canadian education are sufficient compare to Chineseeducation. However, the number of case study and disease are not sufficient compare toChinese education. The Canadian clinical education are smaller, only small clinic forstudents to practice, the number of case study and disease are limited, therefore clinicaltraining is not sufficient.After graduated from Chinese TCM and Acupuncture College, students are required tocomplete one to two years of hospital internship, combine the knowledge from textbook andhands-on clinical practice. The Canadian graduates has no such opportunities, the student areenter to cruel market directly after graduation. This is one of the main reasons Canadiangraduates have low survival rate. Canadian clinical education have limited resource, this isimportant improvement that Canadian clinical education needs to focus on during thecentury.Canadian TCM and Acupuncture clinical education is market economy as the dominant.TCM education and TCM clinics are dominated by the market economy. Private institutionsare the leader in TCM and Acupuncture clinical education is at the early stage of enteringpublic education institutions.TCM and Acupuncture clinical education trends and reform: Due to legislation forcingthe overseas Acupuncture and TCM practitioner can take the "pure Chinese" path ofdevelopment, which is also the future trends for Canadian Acupuncture and TCM education.It’s developed towards family doctors and professional medical direction; align it withinternational education standards.This paper further discusses the aspect on textbooks, instructors, student, teachingcharacteristics, certification and examination system, training direction, anatomical aspectsof acupuncture and more. Hereafter, the paper carried on the comparison between theChinese and the Canadian TCM education system based on the above mention aspects.