Oceania University of Medicine has partnered with the Mapuifagalele Home of the Aged to offer screenings and other health care services to residents there, on a regular basis.  

O.U.M Vice Chancellor, Tole’afoa Dr. Viali Lameko and O.U.M medical students will visit the home one day per week to conduct a health check and review for all the residents at Mapuifagalele. In addition, Dr. Lameko has offered to give advice on the telephone, as required, 24 hours, seven days of the week.

 “We are so grateful for the service that Dr. John Adams has provided to the residents of Mapuifagalele for the past twenty years. We have also been praying for an additional doctor to help Dr. Adams,” said Sister Aloisia of Mapuifagalele Home of the Aged.  

“Then four weeks ago, Dr. Lameko called me on the phone and asked for an appointment to see me. Apparently he visited us on the same day, and offered the service by the Medical School to look after the sick at Mapuifagalele. 

“I immediately informed the rest of the sisters that our prayers have been answered. It is a blessing to have Dr. Lameko and students of O.U.M to offer this service to the residents of Mapuifagalele.”

In 2010, O.U.M invited stakeholders from the health sector to a two-day workshop, held at Mapuifagalele, on the issue of palliative care.

 “The services now being offered to Mapuifagalele is part of the road map and strategic plan of O.U.M to be implemented before the next visit by our International Accreditors in the year 2020,” said Dr. Lameko. 

“This is one of our community service projects, and I am so happy to get this opportunity to work with the ‘Little Sisters of the Poor’ and many other volunteers at Mapuifagalele.”

O.U.M students from Samoa will visit Mapuifagalele regularly throughout their medical training, and those from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the U.S.A come to Samoa for their clinical attachments will visit Mapuifagalele to learn about geriatric medicine (the growing field of medicine for the aged population). 

 “It’s critical that doctors learn early in their medical education that service to their community is paramount,” said Taffy Gould, Chairman of the O.U.M Council.  “O.U.M is proud to work with Mapuifagalele Home of the Aged and to contribute to the good work the Sisters do there.”

Headquartered on the grounds of the National Hospital Complex in Apia, Samoa, Oceania University of Medicine has a current student body of approximately 185 from five countries and offers an MD degree to its graduates.  Graduates are receiving their post-graduate residency and internship specialty training at teaching hospitals in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Samoa, and the United States. 

O.U.M is accredited by the Philippine Accrediting Association of Schools, Colleges and Universities, listed in the World Directory of Medical Schools—a joint publication of the Foundation for the Advancement of International Medical Education and Research and the World Federation for Medical Education, and recognized by the Education Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates. For more information about O.U.M, visit www.oum.edu.ws.