gms | German Medical Science

The editorial in the 4^th issue of the GMS Zeitschrift für Medizinische Ausbildung (GMS Z Med Ausbild) [1] noted with satisfaction that the Gesellschaft für Medizinische Ausbildung (GMA) had entered a very dynamic phase of development, the membership having doubled within two years to reach 400. Younger members, including more than 70 medical students, had invigorated the activities of the GMA. The visibility of the GMA in graduate and postgraduate medical education had noticeably increased, and accordingly its imprint on Faculties of Medicine, politics and professional self-regulation had grown. Five continuous core activities were identified as the basis for the increasing role of the GMA:

1.

an efficient GMA head office;

2.

an effective presence on the internet including content management capabilities;

3.

the GMS journal Zeitschrift für Medizinische Ausbildung;

4.

the annual conference “Quality in Teaching”;

5.

the GMA task forces.

In 2011 the association will grow beyond 800 individual or institutional members and thus will double its membership again (GMA 800 plus). The number of institutional members has quadrupled (from 7 to 30), 100 medical, dental or veterinary students work for the GMA, and our members come from German speaking Medical Faculties or Medical Universities in Austria, Germany and Switzerland: the GMA has evolved into an international, German speaking association! The GMA finances its activities, including the journal (see below), through membership contributions and therefore is independent of undesirable influences. As of November 17, 2007 a new constitution was introduced (amendment October 24, 2010), and new procedural rules were put into effect, which opened new avenues of innovations. It seems appropriate at this point in time to scrutinize old and new GMA core activities with a focus on strategy.

Mrs. Beate Herrmannsdörfer for years has now been at the core of an efficient GMA membership administration and the editorial office of the GMS Zeitschrift für Medizinische Ausbildung (GMS Z Med Ausbild); her responsibilities include finances, production and peer-review of the journal, content management of internet pages, production and distribution of the GMA Newsletter (GMA Nachrichten) and since recently the coordination of the GMA Task Force National Competence-Based Learning Objectives for Undergraduate Medical Education (NKLM) in Germany [2]. A grant from the Robert-Bosch-Foundation made it possible to establish a dedicated NKLM office attached to the Faculty of Health, University of Witten/Herdecke as of January 1, 2011 to relieve the work pressure on Mrs Herrmannsdörfer somewhat.

Our growing association requires a gradual increase of Mrs. Herrmannsdörfer’s working hours from her current 30 hours/week. Special thanks to Mrs. Herrmannsdörfer from the GMA board, all members and the authors of the GMS Z Med Ausbild for her inexhaustible energy and contagious optimism, all of which carry the association forward! She also cooperates seamlessly with the very supportive team from the German Medical Science publisher, Mrs. Simone Haas and Anita Eppelin.

In 2009 and 2010 GMA’s internet presence was re-designed and the technology updated; the result is much more functional (http://www.gesellschaft-medizinische-ausbildung.org). We are indebted to our member Thomas Shiozawa, Tübingen for digitizing all issues of the GMS Z Med Ausbild (former Medizinische Ausbildung – Mitteilungsblatt der Gesellschaft für Medizinische Ausbildung) going back to 1984, which now are available as the ZMA Archiv on the GMA website – fully searchable! A password-protected forum is now available for our members for group formation and interaction as needed by the GMA Task Forces and GMA Regional Groups. We are considering the integration of public social networks into the GMA internet presentation and welcome any ideas at this stage! Digital analysis of our web users will help us to learn about the needs of GMA members. We are proud to have had 85.000 visitors and 850.000 pages accessed in 2010.

In 2005 the former periodical Medizinische Ausbildung (then in its 22^nd year) was transformed into an open-access digital scientific journal: GMS Zeitschrift für Medizinische Ausbildung (GMS Z Med Ausbild, http://www.egms.de/dynamic/de/journals/zma/index.htm). Printed issues are also available on request. The GMA owns and edits the journal, using the portal German Medical Science (http://www.egms.de) as the publisher [3]. The open-access policy maintains the rights of the authors and GMA members can publish free of charge. The GMS Z Med Ausbild is free from advertisements because the costs are kept low through the work of the editorial office (Mrs. Herrmannsdörfer), with the remainder being covered by the association’s membership fees. The editorial office of the GMS Z Med Ausbild (ZMA) is located at the head office in Erlangen and editorial work consumes a large part of Mrs. Herrmannsdörfer’s working hours. We maintain a meticulous peer-review system and international rules for scientific publishing. We are fortunate to have the support of a large group of active reviewers. Since its launch in 2005, GMS Zeitschrift für Medizinische Ausbildung has benefited from the expertise of 87 reviewers. Their contribution to the quality of the journal cannot be overestimated; they contribute anonymously, in their spare time and without remuneration. We would like to, at the very least, commend their efforts at this stage. The editors, authors and readers of GMS Zeitschrift für Medizinische Ausbildung as well as the publishers of the portal German Medical Science would like to express their sincere thanks to the following reviewers who supported us during 2010: see attachment [Attach. 1].

In 2010 we took major steps forward for more international visibility with the journal now being published completely bilingually (German-English). The journal applied for inclusion in MEDLINE^® on April 28, 2010 and we expect the decision by April 2011. The GMS J Med Ausbild had 45.000 filtered (i.e. excluding search engine hits) visitors during 2010.

The annual GMA conference enjoys increasing popularity and has developed into the major forum for the exchange of ideas, research results and development in graduate and postgraduate medical education in German speaking Central Europe. The annual conference in Bochum 2010 attracted 538 registered visitors and we excpect a significant increase for the conference in Munich in 2011 (http://www.gma2011.de) as well as for Aachen 2012 and Graz, Austria, 2013. The conference in Graz is also an indication for the development of the German speaking GMA into an international Austrian-German-Swiss association.

At these annual conferences two GMA Prizes are also presented, the GMA Prize for Young Teachers and the GMA Prize for Teaching Students.

GMA Task Forces at the behest of the GMA Board carry out significant work with the overall goal to improve medical graduate and postgraduate medical education, including continuous medical education. The GMA constitution stipulates the promotion of interprofessional co-operation among health professions, currently being tackled by the newest GMA Task Force for Interprofessional Education in the Health Professions. Representatives of academic health professions have joined to formulate and suggest new forms of interprofessional medical education for a health care system of the future [4]. The largest Task Force is the GMA Task Force NKLM [2] with 100-120 GMA members and members of other medical associations. GMA Task Forces typically publish position or focus papers in the GMS Z Med Ausbild and are present at events to offer opportunities for discussion.

The new GMA constitution of November 17, 2007 has not only made it possible to include members from dental and veterinary medicine as well as representatives from Austria and Switzerland on the board but also to establish GMA Regional Groups [5]. Shortly after the foundation of the first GMA Regional Group in in Erlangen, additional groups have started in Munich, the Ruhr and most recently in Tübingen. These regional GMA groups will further stimulate its growth and development.

The GMA has started 2011 with the prospect to increase its membership up to 800. The annual conference will represent a key point as the complete GMA board will be newly elected, making room for the younger generation. The GMS Z Med Ausbild, now bilingual, will definitely attract even more first class papers in medical education research and will be much more visible through PubMed Central. Provided the MEDLINE^® application is going to be successful, the journal will gain in impact within a few years and be much more attractive for ambitious German-speaking young researchers. In other words, at a time when excellence in teaching is finally seen as important as excellence in research [6], the GMA will be well prepared for the future! We have to primarily thank our members and the authors of our journal, the GMA board and the ZMA publishing committee for their dedicated work which has made this possible!

And lastly a plea to all of you who see an opportunity for a better health service by improving medical education:

Please take part in the GMA and get at least one or two colleagues, students institutions to join the GMA in 2011 and if at all possible attend the Munich conference. If we all manage that, we could quickly double the size of our membership, our activities, funds and influence!

The author declare that he has no competing interests.

Note for the references: only editorials of the GMS Z Med Ausbild are included here which describe the development of core activities of the GMA and their strategy. All are authored by Eckhart G. Hahn, chief editor of GMS Z Med Ausbild unless otherwise stated.]