Problem-Based Learning in Health Sciences

From AD 1897 when Taiwan had its first medical education institution that commenced the development of its medical education, through the changing times and evolution of political culture in the past 120 years to the rapid progress in scientific and technological knowledge, rapid changes in the global medical environment, and the transformation and innovation in world medical education in recent 20 to 30 years, medical educators of different countries, with no exception, have developed contents of medical education specifically their own in response to their own environmental needs. Taiwan’s medical educators have also realized that the problems confronting today’s medicine in its theory and practice have become increasingly complicated. The development of western medicine in an Eastern cultural milieu has to meet the needs of local environment for it to last. And thus, many experts and scholars, in addition to continuously engaging in international exchanges to learn the knowledge and experience of the reform of medical education overseas, also continue to carry out teaching experiments, revisions, and adjustments in Taiwan, making relentless effort in developing and seeking learning methods that suit our medical students. The Taiwan Association of Medical Education, since its establishment in 2004, has devoted itself to improving the quality of medical education, strengthening the medical education academic exchanges within and without Taiwan. The Association also publishes the Journal of Medical Education at regular intervals, which has become an academic research and results exchange platform for Taiwan’s medical educators. Since 2012, the entire Journal of Medical Education has been published in English, further facilitating the exchanges between Taiwan’s medical educators and the international academic circles. This year marks the 120th year in the development of Taiwan’s medical education. In order to keep a record of the efforts made by Taiwan’s scholars in the past, the Association has specially published a book, Problem Based Learning, gathering in it the research results published by medical educators in the past 20 years of the research on the reforms of Taiwan’s medical education. The contents of the papers cover issues regarding learning methods and considerations of cultural backgrounds, the uses and definition of PBL in medical education and health sciences, theories and practices of PBL, the situations of the uses of PBL in the contexts of Asia-Pacifi c countries, the perceptions of students on PBL, and the revisions, adjustments and prospect of PBL. We take this opportunity to thanks all experts and scholars who have devoted themselves to promoting the reform and research of medical education for their dedication and contribution. We believe that the publication of this book enables readers to further understand the development of PBL in Taiwan, and expect that they can see the evolution of Taiwan’s medical education from a historical and social-cultural perspective, which thus can certainly bring new hopes to Taiwan’s future medical education, medical development and medical progress!