Beginnings

In 1956, three doctors felt an urgent need for a strong and progressive school of medicine in the City of Cebu to accommodate deserving students who could not pursue medical education elsewhere.

The idea of the three doctors was enthusiastically received and sustained by Dr. Jacinto Velez. In a series of brainstorming meetings, an organization plan was established and a corporation was formed with the following as incorporators: Dr. and Mrs Jacinto Velez, Dr. Eugenio Alonso Dr. Benito Antigua, Dr. Uldarico Bacay, Dr. Nicolas Escario, Dr. Renato Espinosa and Dr. Jose Tolentino.

An affiliation with the Cebu Institute of Technology was effected with the approval of its president Dr. Nicolas Escario, a friend and classmate of Dr. Velez. Hence, an application for the opening of the future Cebu Institute of Technology College of Medicine was submitted on January 31, 1957 with the Bureau of Private Education.

Construction was started at the back of the then Velez Clinic for classrooms, laboratories and offices. Laboratory and library facilities were acquired, cadavers were obtained, and efforts to recruit the medical faculty from local physicians were made. With the help of Dr. Virgilio Ramos, then dean of UST College of Medicine and former classmate of Dr. Velez, two members of the UST faculty were convinced to migrate to Cebu -- Dr. Fernando Santos (Biochemistry) and Dr. Manuel Alvarez (Physiology and Pharmacology) together with their technicians.

On June 10, 1957, the CIT College of Medicine opened its doors to 47 first year students, 33 of whom graduated in 1962 to compose the CIM pioneer class in the five year curriculum.

Dr. Uldarico C. Bacay assumed the deanship of the Cebu Institute of Medicine after Dr. Jacinto Velez, Sr. became the president of CIM. Dr. Eugenio Alonso became the dean in 1971, followed by Dr. Constancio Camomot in 1975, Dr. Jose Paradela in 1976, and Dr. Josefina L. Poblete as the present dean.

In 1966, with the establishment of Velez College, the CIT-College of Medicine terminated its affiliation with the Cebu Institute of Technology to become a sister institution of Velez College. It was converted into a non-stock, non-profit corporation, and became the Cebu Institute of Medicine headquartered in a five-story edifice at the corner of F. Ramos and V. Ranudo Sts.

The optimism, desire and enthusiasm of the group centered on these objectives: (1) To provide the undergraduates a firm basic education in medicine and to foster habits of scholarship and academic excellence; (2) To contribute to the advancement of knowledge through research; and (3) To assist in the development of teachers, investigators, and practitioners, both urban and rural, through programs of graduate education including residency training.

To further promote these aims the school joined the Association of Philippine Medical Colleges, assisting in the improvement and upgrading of the medical education in the country. The Faculty of Instruction also increased so as to cope with the growing number of students. And a program for training the school’s graduates for faculty positions and hospital residencies was strengthened.

In SY 1968 -69, CIM shifted to a four-year curriculum, integrating some clinical courses and shortening the internship program.

Cebu (Velez) General Hospital (CVGH), CIM’s main teaching hospital, became one of the biggest private hospitals outside Manila at this time. Practically all patients admitted were and still are teaching cases, except for a few private patients who insisted on strict privacy. Thus, the chairs of the departments of the CIM are concurrently the chairs of the departments of CVGH and the Dean of the Cebu Institute of Medicine is the Medical Director of CVGH, the teaching hospital. This facilitates the coordination of the education and training of the medical students.

The year 1967 saw the establishment of the Cebu Institute of Medicine - Community Medico-Social Services in the barrio of Pakna-an, Mandaue City to provide a training center and field laboratory for the community-oriented activities of the Department of Preventive and Social Medicine.

The Community Medicine Program of CIM was original idea of Dr. Florentino Solon who was then in the Regional Health Office of Region 7 in Cebu and the chairman of the Department of Preventive and Social Medicine of CIM. Exploratory talks were done with the barangay and local school officials and the CIM administration and they agreed on how the program would be implemented. Thus the Cebu Institute of Medicine, Community Medico-Social Services was born, directed towards identifying community health problems and formulating solutions to these problems while providing community health services. In the process, it would also teach both students and physicians how to deal with these problems and provide training for the medical students during their internship for public health in the areas of service and research.

This rural internship project has the distinct honor of being the first and the best among the medical schools in the country. The popularity of the program has been highlighted in many positive reports and comments from both national and international personalities who have come to visit and observe its many innovative health activities.

Aware of the present health needs of the country and realizing the importance of the general practitioners as providers of health care, the Department of Preventive and Social Medicine of CIM decided to establish the Residency Training in Family and Community Medicine in 1972, the first among the medical schools in the country. The establishment of the Residency Training was envisioned to provide a harmonious union between clinical, family and community medicine.

In July 2004, CIM received the Master TB Educators Grant from Philtips, administered by the Department of Family & Community Medicine. The CIM-CMSS is also now an accredited DOTS Center accredited by PhilCAT and Philhealth. It is a Philheath accredited facility for Maternity Services as well. Thus, this type of primary medical care facility is also meant to demonstrate to the student how to establish a clinic facility in a community and the needed equipment and the accreditations that can be obtained. This will be of great value for the students when they intend to go home to their communities to practice after their training.

CIM’s quest for excellence can be traced back from its very inception as exemplified by its stated vision: Physician with a Heart; and its mission: To produce graduates who are professionally competent, socially concerned and guided by a correct conscience in all their actions. Founded on this notable intent, CIM has steadily advanced to a heightened excellence in medical education.

The fourth decade (1987-1997) in CIM’s history is highlighted by its elevation to the highest category for medical schools, Level IV, by the Board of Medical Education on February 16, 1987, connoting CIM as a medical institution of high quality with exemplary performance.

Another distinctive phenomenon of this era was the announcement by the Commission of Higher Education (CHED) in 1996 that CIM had been singled out as one of the three Centers of Excellence for medicine nationwide. It earned the distinction of being the only Center of Excellence for the entire Visayas and Mindanao. An important consequence of this is entrusting CIM with a lead role in upgrading medical education in the region. CIM’s response to this challenge can be seen in its offering of different short courses and trainings to medical practitioners in the region.

One more milestone of prominence that marked this era was the establishment of the Clinical Epidemiology Unit (CEU), an affiliate of the Southeast Asian Clinical Epidemiology Network.

In 1993, after having completed their Rockefeller-sponsored one-year course work towards a master’s degree in Clinical Epidemiology, Dr. Manuel Emerson Donaldo and Dr. Ma. Fidelis Espiritu-Quiza initiated the CEU under the sponsorship of Dean Josefina L. Poblete. The primary mission was to improve the research capability of the faculty and students. This assistance was eventually extended to residents not just in the Cebu (Velez) General Hospital but also to residents training and requiring research for certification of specialty training in the nearby hospitals.

This research arm of the institution conducts different research methodology workshops for various specialty societies, hospital residents, and students of medical schools in Visayas and Mindanao. It also provides consultative services to students, residents, consultants and faculty members undertaking research studies.

In the early 1990s, the Association of the Philippines Medical Colleges (APMC) conducted a seminar in the school and introduced the innovative curriculum of integration (horizontal or vertical) and Problem-Based Learning (PBL) to members of faculty as the educational strategy for the instruction in medical schools to address the knowledge explosion of medical sciences.

The PBL approach was recommended for its promotion of self-directed learning, critical thinking and better interpersonal relationship in students, attributes vital in the practice of medicine.

Since 2000, from the 2nd to the 5th Asia-Pacific Conference on Problem-Based Learning in Health Science in Manila, Singapore, Taiwan, and Malaysia and the Asia Pacific Medical Education Conferences in Singapore, members of the faculty attended and participated in such conferences. Foremost among them was Dr. Mario Sanchez, who had his Fellowship in International Medical Education at the University of Texas, Medical Branch, Galveston, Texas, U.S.A and the UTMB Introductory Facilitator Training Workshop of the same institution from January to July 2002. Dr. Sanchez was credited for putting the system of PBL at CIM in place and the success of the first batch of PBL graduates of CIM.

In academic year 2001-2002, the institution initially implemented the competency-based PBL approach curriculum in the first year class and became fully PBL in all three year levels by school year 2003-2004.

The first batch of the full PBL students graduated in April of 2005 and took the board examinations that same year. From the first PBL class, during the August 2006 exam, 98% passed with two students topping the board examinations namely, Erwyn Novilla, third place; Jun Maximo Lasco, sixth; in the February 2007 exam 100% passed and one student, Omid Etemadi, obtained the sixth place.

Most recently in December 2007, CIM became the third medical school in the country and the first in the Visayas and Mindanao to be accredited by Philippine Accrediting Association of Schools, Colleges and Universities (PAASCU).

From its 33 graduates in 1962, CIM has produced about 4,700 graduates, 35 of whom graduated with honors. Some 110 of its graduates have placed in the top ten of the Physician’ Licensure Examinations with eight graduates in first place. Its graduates over the past years have obtained a high over all passing percentage of 85% or better, keeping CIM among the first five top medical schools in the country. In 2006, the passing percentage for the board exams of the first graduates of PBL was 92%. And thereafter, for the next 3 board exams, the passing percentage was 100%.

Since its founding to the present the school has maintained its standards as envisioned by its founders.

The Faculty Development Program started in 1963 wherein six faculty members were sent on a fellowship training for two years through the sponsorship of the USAID. Among them was Dr. Virginia Mesola, who was sent to West Virginia University, U.S.A. for her Masters in Microbiology and who now presently heads the Department of Microbiology. Since then, a good number of the faculty has been sent to other institutions in Manila and Thailand for their masteral studies. Aside from such grants, the school has also been holding regular summer for workshops for faculty development.

The latest effort of CIM to further improve the professional profile of its faculty, the Masteral Course in Professional Health Education was started in 2005 in cooperation with the University of the Philippines. Six members of the faculty are currently taking the course.

The alumni have continuously been involved in the activities of CIM. They have donated books and equipment, sponsored scholars, renovated the amphitheaters, helped in the construction of the skills laboratory, improved the other facilities to make student life more comfortable, efforts very much appreciated by the students.

In 1980, the CIT COM-CIM Alumni Association’s legal personality became official as the Cebu Institute of Medicine Alumni Association, Inc. (CIMAAI), with chapters in Manila headed by Dr. Nelson Abelardo (Class 75), in Eastern USA which is formally called the American Society of Cebu Institute of Medicine Alumni, Inc. under Dr. Dominador Ong, and in Bacolod led by Dr. Severo Lacson (Class ’74).

In 2006, Dr. Thelma La Rosa-Fernandez assumed the presidency of the Cebu Institute Alumni Association and with her vice president, Dr. Pek Eng Lim laid the groundwork for the Golden Jubilee Celebration of CIM.