EDITORIAL

Re-defining the profesión

The present issue of EDUCACIÓN MÉDICA offers a special collaboration of Professor Rodríguez reflecting critically on the survey carried out by his research team on medical profession sampled from the Barcelona’s Medical Association membership. The analysis of the impinging factors (social environment and organizational working environment) on the medical competencies demanded from the physicians showed trends well identified. It is also worth of attention the ability of the surveyors in extracting from the surveyed something more than the fashionable disappointment of the profession "burn-out syndrome" to make apparent that the physicians, in spite of it all, have not forgotten but still believe on the values of medicine, something that can be encapsulated into the concept of Professionalism.

Why should a specialized journal on education be concerned on this topic? Why such a paper should be of interest to educationalist? We consider as self-evident that the challenges posed at the beginning of the XXIst century and impinging into the competences of the medical profession also challenge the educational system understood in its broadest sense (Hippocratic Oath) involving, therefore not only the professional educationalist but the educational function of every physician.

It is already time to remember before educationalist are reminded that medical education is not an end by itself but serve the social function of producing capable professionals endowed with the proper competencies (knowledge, abilities and attitudes) to serve society as it is expected from the medical profession.

Albert Oriol-Bosch