DEVELOPMENT OF HIGHER MEDICAL EDUCATION ABROAD IN THE STUDIES OF UKRAINIAN COMPARATIVISTS

Abstract

The article presents a synthesized historiographical analysis of Ukrainian pedagogical comparativistsʼ works on the development of higher medical education in foreign countries, identifying trends, achievements, bottlenecks, and prospects for studying this problem. The presented sample of dissertations, monographs, and textbooks demonstrated their narrow country-specific vector and similarity in formulating the subject of research. Historiographical and comparative analysis revealed similar approaches of scientists to determining trends in the development and functioning of national systems of professional training for doctors. These concern the preservation and expansion of decentralization in higher medical education management; strengthening the interaction of its various links; shifting emphasis in determining the prerequisites for the development of national higher medical education systems from “traditional” factors (political, socio-economic, cultural situation of the country, etc.) to clarifying the influences of international medical organizations and documents in the field of healthcare that substantiate general strategies for training doctors in higher medical education institutions, etc. Scientists also propose original approaches to studying the functioning of national systems of higher medical education. These are manifested in the development of authors periodizations and classifications of the specified process; thorough characteristics of university environments for training future doctors in different countries; comprehensive understanding of the determinants of their formation and development, which, in addition to social, economic, and cultural factors of the country's development, relate to the level of education of the population, its multiculturalism, the specifics of educational systems, etc. In these perspectives, the analyzed studies mark two main country-specific vectors of research in higher medical education: “overseas” (USA and Canada) and “European” (mainly Great Britain, Poland, and German-speaking countries).