The result of a partnership between the Brazilian Ministry of Health and the Angolan government, the general and family medicine training project brings together 50 Angolan doctors at Brazilian universities. The initiative is taking place simultaneously at several higher education institutions in the country and seeks to promote an exchange between the public health systems of Brazil and Angola. At Unicamp, the project is being carried out by the Faculty of Medical Sciences (FCM), in partnership with the Campinas Health Department.
The university's extension dimension is presented to visitors through the Extension Without Borders program — an initiative of Unicamp and Unesp —, coordinated by the Office of the Vice-Rector for Extension, Sports and Culture (Proeec). For the first time, Angolan professionals carry out practical activities in basic health units and get to know first-hand the university's work in comprehensive medical training. The project lasts three months, and upon returning to Angola, the doctors must complete a period of ten years of work in the country's public service.
Professor Rubens Bredikow, FCM's outreach coordinator, explains that, although this year's project has innovative aspects, the agreement between the university and the Angolan government will complete 20 years in 2025. “In these two decades, doctors have come to study specialties, as if it were a medical residency course. They stay here for two, three, even five years, and then this 'in-service training' certificate is revalidated in Angola as a specialization,” he commented.
The current initiative, however, marks a new moment in this partnership. “This is the first time we have received doctors to work in family and community medicine, rather than in hospitals. They are all allocated to 25 health centers in the city, two per unit. The idea is to show how primary health care works in Brazil, which involves multidisciplinary teams in direct contact with the population,” adds the professor.
In addition to the practical activities from Monday to Thursday in the health units, on Fridays the doctors meet at Unicamp for formative discussions. According to Bredikow, this moment is essential for the project. “In the extension, the proposal is that both learn and teach. We want to understand how they relate to the communities there and show how we do it here. University extension should be transformative for society and for the university.”
Third-year medical student Maria Antônia Kahala highlights the benefits of cooperation. “We came here to exchange experiences. Brazil has a more advanced model of community medicine and we want to learn how this work is structured in communities. Our government sent us with this mission: to build a new approach based on what we have learned here.”
Edgar Sanhangala, also a medical student, sees the experience as a chance to bring improvements to the health of his province. “We work with preventable diseases, many of which are linked to stress, such as hypertension and diabetes. Our hope is to apply what we learn to change the health system. We know that we will find good practices here that can help us transform the reality there.”
The initiative reinforces the role of extension at public universities as a potential driver of social transformation. According to the professor, the expectation is that this will be just the first group of many. “The idea is for the project to continue in cycles. We will negotiate the arrival of new professionals according to the capacity of the health units and the involvement of the Municipal Health Department. There is a strong desire to make it work, and extension is the way to do that.”
