Sunday, 10 September 2006
JEDDAH: In 2007, Batterjee Medical College (BMC) will open its doors to students wishing to pursue various medical, dental, pharmaceutical, and health promotion careers.
"We have been working on this for more than three years," said Khalid Batterjee, college vice president and chief executive and a specialist in orthopedics."We are laying the foundation in 2006 and over the next three years, we will open each of the college's department."
Batterjee said the vision of the college's founders is to design, construct and operate five medical colleges to the highest international standards and provide the Kingdom and the region with well-trained health care professionals to meet the rising demand for quality health care.
BMC is the first integrated private college for medical sciences and technology in the country, and is considered to be the biggest and most modern medical college in the Middle East. Established by Bait Al-Batterjee Co. for medical projects, it includes nine medical colleges and institutes to accommodate 4,000 male and female students.
Located north of Jeddah on the Red Sea coast, the college has been designed by a German engineering firm as an integrated, modern university.
"It will be equipped with the most modern scientific technologies," Batterjee said.
The college will offer a bachelor of science degree accredited by the Kingdom's Ministry of Higher Education, the Saudi Council for Health Specialties and some universities in Germany and Africa, Batterjee said. When the departments finally open their doors, the university will offer degree programs in general medicine, nursing, physiotherapy, health administration, dentistry, medical imaging, pharmacy, lab technology and health information management.
The high standard of certificates and studies granted from BMC qualify the graduates to take up all suitable jobs and positions related to their specialties. All colleges and departments are well-equipped and established according to the requirements of the national and international medical workforce needs.
The college will also offer scholarships to some students that will include tuition, room and board.
"We want to build a new society that will start learning in a new way," Batterjee said. "We want them to take the information they will gain here and use it. We want them to know that learning is supposed to be fun and not stressful, as it is in other places."
By Shroog Talal Radain
© The Saudi Gazette 2006
