What students learned from “Thai medicine seminar”: Implication for education in medical communication

Abstract

Nowadays, the use of complementary and alternative medicines by people is becoming more popular as an additional therapy to western medicine. Traditional medicine, which is a part of complementary and alternative medicines, is utilized complementarily with the dominant health-care model in Thailand. In Thailand, Thai traditional medicine is considered as one of the most valuable in their practice as an additional therapy. In terms of influence on university students, Thai traditional medicine seems to benefit university students’ mental health. However, little is known about what university students in multidisciplinary specialty learn from Thai traditional medicine, especially students outside Thailand. We aimed to study the learning impact of Thai Medicine Seminar, especially focused on the lesson of Thai traditional massage, for university students in Japan. Thai Medicine Seminar was conducted as an elective course for students of the University of Tokyo. Post-class reports from 26 students were analyzed qualitatively by thematic analysis. Nineteen codes were generated which were integrated into four categories: [Learning about Thai traditional medicine], [Learning about one’s own mind and body], [Learning about relationships with others], and [Improvement of learning motivation for diverse studies]. From Thai Medicine Seminar, students learned not only the nature of Thai traditional medicine but also aspects of mind-body awareness and relationships with others.