Australian Med School Rankings

[redshifteffect]

People asked me so here it is:

http://trade.isubscribe.com.au/title_info.cfm?prodID=2384

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Members don't see this ad.

 

[pitman]

There's also the online version:
http://www.thegoodguides.com.au/searchguide.cfm

Pay subscription only, i did it for a month when researching Aus. schools, helped a *little*.

 

[tl47]

Hey, care to share a bit more than just a tempting link to books/websites that require my credit card before even seeing a sample?

Hint hint!

 

[pitman]

Here's another ranking for all Asian uni's (Asia Week's guide):

http://www.asiaweek.com/asiaweek/features/universities2000/schools/multi.overall.html

 

[redshifteffect]

Originally posted by pitman
Here's another ranking for all Asian uni's (Asia Week's guide):

http://www.asiaweek.com/asiaweek/features/universities2000/schools/multi.overall.html

Have any of you guys found an online ranking for Medical schools?

 

[pitman]

Nope. Good Guides online comes the closest, with some results of student polls.

 

[pitman]

Good Guide just came out again...

http://www.uq.edu.au/news/index.phtml?article=7660

(I don't mean to plug UQ at the expense of other schools -- the Guide itself is available only w/ paid subscription, so this is a UQ news page)

Note that the Guide still only rates the unis as a whole though, not the med programs themselves.

 

[Cziffra]

In fact there's a world ranking of the top 100 biomedicine universities published by the very well-respected Times Higher Education Supplement in the UK. Do a simple google search and you'll find it. It's a ranking of biomedicine, not medical schools per se. (Some of the following universities don't have a medical school.) However, the correlation between the two should be evident.

Here is the top 20:
1) Harvard (US)
2) Cambridge (UK)
3) Oxford (UK)
4) Imperial College London (UK)
5) Stanford (US)
6) Johns Hopkins (US)
7) Karolinska Institute (Sweden)
8) Yale (US)
9) UC Berkeley (US)
10) UCSD (US)
11) Beijing (China)
12) MIT (US)
13) Tokyo (Japan)
14) Melbourne (Australia)
15) Sydney (Australia)
16) Heidelberg (Germany)
17) Duke (US)
18) UCSF (US)
19) University College London (UK)
20) Toronto (Canada)

This is probably the only world ranking of medicine out there.

 

[Cziffra]

Many Australian universities (particularly USyd, Unimelb, UNSW, and ANU) have a very high reputation internationally. Disregard those who think non-US universities are worthless. There's a world out there. Enough said.

Go to Johns Hopkins, Harvard, etc. medicine homepage, check out the faculty page and discover the Australian-trained doctors teaching the MDs-to-be there!

 

[JoeNamaMD]

Many Australian universities (particularly USyd, Unimelb, UNSW, and ANU) have a very high reputation internationally. Disregard those who think non-US universities are worthless. There's a world out there. Enough said.

Go to Johns Hopkins, Harvard, etc. medicine homepage, check out the faculty page and discover the Australian-trained doctors teaching the MDs-to-be there!

The Gourman report has a listing of top international medical schools. The Gourman list tends to favor large well known research universities, the vast majority of top international(non US and Canadian schools) seem to be located in France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Ireland, and Japan. With increasing integration among the EU universities, I think they will be as good if not better than US schools within a decade.

 

[pitman]

http://www.thes.co.uk/statistics/international_comparisons/2004/main.aspx

Extending Cziffra's biomed list:

34) ANU
37) Monash
45) UQ
53) U South Australia
68) UNSW
81) Adelaide Univ
96) UWA

Pretty sweet

 

[pitman]

The Gourman report has a listing of top international medical schools.

At least when I was younger, the big problem with the Gourman report was that the authors don't reveal their methodology, and apparently the score differences separating many many schools are insignificant. Maybe they've changed, but i've never given any meaning to their lists.

 

[pitman]

here's a pretty typical critique found via google:
http://siop.org/tip/backissues/TIPJan02/07bedeian.htm

 

[sjkpark]

http://www.thes.co.uk/statistics/international_comparisons/2004/main.aspx

Extending Cziffra's biomed list:

34) ANU
37) Monash
45) UQ
53) U South Australia
68) UNSW
81) Adelaide Univ
96) UWA

Pretty sweet

Add in 36) University of Auckland, New Zealand! Yeah!

 

[brightblueeyes]

In fact there's a world ranking of the top 100 biomedicine universities published by the very well-respected Times Higher Education Supplement in the UK. Do a simple google search and you'll find it. It's a ranking of biomedicine, not medical schools per se. (Some of the following universities don't have a medical school.) However, the correlation between the two should be evident.

I respect the Times Higher Education Supplements when they're limited to the UK but I think the Times sometimes makes big mistakes in some countries. For example, one of the three French universities it lists among the top biomedical universities not only does not have a medical school, it has no biomedical faculty, students or researchers whatsoever. It doesn't even have a Science Faculty...it's an Arts school. Of the three French universities listed, only one is considered to have a top notch med school by the French. And the university traditionally regarded as having the best medical school and the largest centre of excellence for biomedical research in France isn't even listed.

I don't know how reliable the rankings are for Australia. From all that I've heard, several Australian universities are excellent for biomedical research (better than most American universities) but I have no idea how they rank relative to each other.

 

[deleted59964]

The problem with rankings is that they mainly reflect research output, and grants obtained. This has little to do with the quality of the teaching of medical students (or other undergraduate - non research) degrees. In fact, Melbourne uni which is generally regarded as one of the most prestigious unis (due to research performance) frequently gets much poorer ratings in "quality of teaching" surveys of students than less well known unis.

I'm not bagging Melb Uni, just pointing out that research and teaching quality are very different. The research reputation of a uni may be important to you - fair enough - but I think most prospective med students would be more interested to know about the teaching.

 

[brightblueeyes]

The Economist publishes an annual review of education. They seem to like the survey done by a Chinese University.

http://ed.sjtu.edu.cn/ranking.htm

These are overall rankings (not biomed) and are based on citations. The Australian schools don't fare quite so well in this ranking as in the Times one.

56 Australian National Univ
57 U of Florida (useful benchmark...)
82 Melbourne
101-150* U of Q
101-150* U of Sydney

* The schools below 100 are only ranked in broad categories

These kind of rankings aren't very useful because it is individual departments that matter when choosing a medical school. Also, rankings are driven by research which often has little impact on teaching.

The Jiao Tong rankings are worthless for some countries. For France they rank Paris VI, Paris XI and Strasbourg I ahead of all the Ecoles Normales Supérieures and l'Ecole Polytechnique. I can pretty much guarantee you that (so long as their program exists) any student at Paris VI, Paris XI or Strasbourg would leap at the chance to switch to any ENS or l'Ecole Polytechnique...even if it meant starting over...even if it meant gnawing off a little finger (I'm exaggerating...slightly. )

As for College de France (which Jiao Tong seems to assume is a "college" in the North American sense of the word), there are no programs, no diplomas and no registered students. Oops.

 

[sinequanon]

Those 'biomedicine' rankings are practically useless for comparing medical schools. For example, you might notice MIT on the list. HELLO! MIT doesn't have a medical school and their breadth of biomed research is pretty darn small compared to most universities that DO have a medical school and teaching hospital. So, that being said I would step outside of rankings to make decisions about matriculation and away rotations etc. They are merely for those with a paucity of information and understanding. Search websites for beds, current faculty, areas of active research, funding and student experiences. If you are a dreaming premed or parent wishing to gloat, then by all means use the rankings for those purposes.

 

[Daemos]

way to bump a thread that's over 4 years old...

 

[Raigon]

So basically... there is no world ranking for medical schools... And our professors kept saying our University ranked 2nd best in Asia. Liar.

But which schools do best in matches in the United States? Or which school will let you become a doctor and practice in the United States?

 

[shan564]

So basically... there is no world ranking for medical schools... And our professors kept saying our University ranked 2nd best in Asia. Liar.

But which schools do best in matches in the United States? Or which school will let you become a doctor and practice in the United States?

Schools don't really collect data with regard to that.

As far as the rankings - we all realize that they're of limited value, but it's ridiculous to say that they're "meaningless." Of course they mean something, but we just need to keep in mind that they are all-encompassing for "life sciences and biomedicine." MIT may not have a medical school, but they have quite a bit of research going on in neurosciences, nanotechnology, and other fields that are directly or peripherally related to medicine. The quantity might not be there, but the quality of that work is tremendous.

Again, a high ranking in "life sciences and biomedicine" doesn't directly suggest a high ranking in medicine, but it does make it more likely that the university will have a good medical faculty. So, again, it may not be completely accurate for med schools, but it's definitely not "meaningless" as people on this forum keep saying.