History

HISTORY of ASEAN Region Primary Care Physicians Association (ARPaC)

ARPaC is an international organization that was established to encourage informed and knowledgeable participation of all Primary Care Physician Organizations in ASEAN in order to promote the development and growth of Family Medicine in ASEAN.

The ASEAN Countries included are:

  • Brunei Darussalam
  • The Kingdom of Cambodia
  • The Republic of Indonesia
  • The Lao People’s Democratic Republic
  • The Federation of Malaysia
  • The Union of Myanmar
  • The Republic of the Philippines
  • The Republic of Singapore
  • The Kingdom of Thailand
  • The Socialist Republic of Viet Nam

The 10 ASEAN countries belong to two WHO Regions- SEARO and WEST-PAC regions, thus ARPaC will keep the Primary Care Physicians in ASEAN informed and aware of pertinent issues affecting them.

April 27, 2006

The first workshop was on April 27, 2006 at Nikko Hotel, Jakarta. The result of this workshop is the CONCENSUS OF FIRST ASEAN REGIONAL WORKSHOP on the Improvement of Primary Care Physician Services. The five countries represented were: Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Myanmar and Brunei. Below are the findings of the workshop:

  1. A regional standard of primary care services should be developed in anticipation of ASEAN Free Trade Agreement (AFTA) and other globalization measures, particularly in countries in the early stages of program development.
  2. There are differences in development stages of primary care physician services among member countries of ASEAN. The collaboration among the countries could expedite the development of PCP services where needed.
  3. Every country has its own quality improvement program for primary care physician. The quality improvement program involves various approaches in postgraduate medical training and {A presentation on Guidelines on ASEAN’s Relations with Civil Society Organisations
  4. beginning with undergraduate program. Despite the differences in stages of QIP development, the member countries are in the same path towards quality PCP services. This will be a good foundation for achieving a common quality standard of competence and of services for the region.
  5. The conduct of undergraduate medical education in most countries is increasingly in line with the community need and closely related with the WHO-WONCA and WFME recommendation.
  6. The postgraduate training covers professional capacity improvement requiring registration, certification and accreditation of standard and professionalism. Experiences of various countries provide a road map for improvement at various stages of development.
  7. Lessons learned from member countries’ experience in developing the standard of competence are:
    • Area of competencies is to be defined before developing the standard
    • The need for a socialization and dissemination strategy and tools to reach out to all stake holders (physicians, policy makers, people and press)
    • Assessment tools should be carefully prepared considering the variation of physician training achievement in various settings.
  8. Common guidelines for the development of competence standards in the region will expedite the process of family practice in member countries through benefiting from countries with advanced experiences.
  9. It is important to update the knowledge in accordance to the new era of medical sciences, such as biotechnology and genomic. An understanding of complementary and alternative medicine should also be considered.
  10. Recognizing the differences or needs between and within countries, the content of the training programs will have to be modified to allow the PCP to be trained to meet the needs.
  11. An academic training base for primary care physician services should be established in universities e.g. in the Public Health or Community Medicine Department, or in a clinical department with a clear mandate for action and be adequate funded and resourced.
  12. A network for continuing development of the primary care physician and primary care physician services is proposed in the ASEAN Framework with distribution of work for optimal results.
  13. In developing family medicine services, other aspects of health system should be integrated considered, i.e. financing system, regulatory system and referral system.
  14. All kinds of specialists should be involved in the development of standard competencies of Primary Care Physician.
  15. Operational research should be scaled up and the government commitment should be increased.

February 10, 2007

On February 10,2007 in Kuala Lumpur, the delegates of ASEAN Regional Primary Care Organizations from all ASEAN countries signed the Declaration of the Family Physicians as: “PRIMARY HEALTH CARE, THE DRIVING FORCE FOR A HEALTHY ASEAN 2020.” The main output of the conference is the Kuala Lumpur Declaration which has the following resolutions:

General Practitioners / Family Physicians in the ASEAN Region shall collaborate ….

  1. To collaborate in sharing knowledge, skills, educational and research resources.
  2. To work with the ASEAN Secretariat and the Medical Association of South East Asian Nations and other organizations as it may deem fir.
  3. To work with Ministry of Health in their own countries.
  4. To work with medical colleges, universities and academies of professional bodies to establish postgraduate educational programs for primary care doctors and to advocate the inclusion of general practice / family medicine in undergraduate medical programs.
  5. To adopt and establish the name of “ASEAN REGIONAL PRIMARY CARE CONFERENCE”, with acronym “ARPaC CONFERENCE”
  6. To set up a Steering Committee of members from each nation and to elect a Chairman, the first being from Indonesia and to rotate the chair every two years
  7. To work towards common standards for quality healthcare, education, training, accreditation and certification to set competencies for general practitioners / family physicians.
  8. To uphold the level of professionalism to meet public expectations.

August 29 – 30, 2008

The annual meeting in Jakarta on August 29 – 30, 2008 reinforced the need to draft the ARPaC Constitution and bylaws which will be led by Malaysia, the formulation of a five year strategic plan which will be led by the Philippines and the construction of an ARPaC website which will be hosted by one of the countries.

( Representatives from Singapore , Cambodia , Vietnam and Myanmar were absent )

Other suggestions include :

  1. Emulating the European Union model
  2. Proposal to formalize ARPaC as a Civil Society under the main ASEAN body

November 11 – 13, 200

A presentation on Guidelines on ASEAN’s Relations with Civil Society Organisations ( CSOs) was delivered by Miss Audiba Suwarso, Technical Officer, ASEAN SocioCultural Community Department, and explained in detail the requirements for ARPaC to fulfil in order for it to be established as a CSO.

The 25 steering committee members from 6 ASEAN countries met and discussed the Constitution and By Laws and formulated the first draft of the Strategic Plan for ARPaC. The Strategic Plan was organized and led by 4 delegates from the Philippines – Dr. Soraya P. Abubakar, Dr. Zorayda E. Leopando, Dr. Eva Irene Yu-Maglonzo and Dr. Cynthia Lazaro-Hipol.

November 24 – 26, 2011

The steering committee members from 6 ASEAN countries decided that the Constitution and By Laws to be finalized by Dr. Thuraiappah and Dr. Abubakar shall be submitted to the ASEAN office and Jakarta, together with the Kuala Lumpur Declaration and the Five year Strategic Plan. Dr. Leopando was tasked to finalize the Strategic Plan.

It was also in November 2011 when 29 participants from 6 ASEAN countries worked together through 3 workshops to develop the Standard for Training Primary Care Physicians for ASEAN countries.

In that meeting it was agreed that the 3rd Biennial Conference shall be held in Manila, hosted by PAFP with Dr. Soraya Abubakar as our Over-all Chair and President of ARPaC.