From 16-20 of September 2009, a delegation of the Ministry of Health of the RM and of the Faculty of Medicine at the University “ Ss.Cyril and Methodius” in Skopje leaded by the Deputy Minister Prof. Vladimir Popovski Ph.D, MD visited the Imperial College in London and establish a series of meetings and appointments with high representatives of the Department in Primary Health Care and Social Medicine Education.

The Imperial College has a long tradition in primary health care education and it is ranked between the first 10 Universities in the world that offers high quality education.

During the meetings, the organisation of the primary health care system in Great Britain was presented in which the Government through the National Health Department, that has a function of the Ministry of Health, is funding operation of trusts for PHC as a basic functional unit for provision of services given by family doctors (doctors of primary health care), that have broader competences, take care of about 90% of health needs of all age groups with small percentage of referrals to the secondary level of health care. 

Between the others, meetings were held with the Prof. Azeem Majeed, Head of the Department for Primary Health Care and Social Medicine, Prof. P. Booton Ph.D, Head of the Primary Health Care Education within the Imperial College and Prof. Saltman Rawaf Ph.D, Head of Public Health and Primary Care in the Imperial College, collaborative centre of WHO.

The key message was that any health care system has to have well developed family medicine, with quality programme of education, available for total population. The cooperation with the Imperial College will continue in the future, with the Centre for Family Medicine, Faculty of Medicine-Skopje, which in cooperation with the Ministry of Health and with financial and technical support through the Health Sector Management Project will start with new Specialisation in Family Medicine on 24 October 2009.  

Representatives of the MOH delegation, Project Coordination Unit and Faculty of Medicine-Skopje starting from 21-23 September pay a visit to the Family Medicine Department, and to the University in Nijmegen in the field of Family Medicine Education.