RCSI and UCD Malaysia Campus (RUMC – formerly Penang Medical College, PMC) was officially launched by Minister Richard Bruton TD, Minister for Education and Skills, Ireland.

The institution’s upgrade to Foreign University Branch Campus was approved by the Malaysian MOE in March this year with its full name Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) and University College Dublin (UCD) Malaysia Campus.

The launch at the University’s Penang campus was also attended by Deputy Director General of Higher Education and Ministry of Education Malaysia, Dr Mohd Nor Azman Bin Hassan, along with the Irish Ambassador to Malaysia, His Excellency Eamon Hickey, RCSI President, Mr Kenneth Mealy, Deputy President UCD, Professor Mark Rogers; and hosted by RUMC President and CEO, Professor Stephen Doughty, together with Vice President (Academic Affairs) and Registrar, Professor David Whitford and the Dean, Professor Mr Premnath Nagalingam.

Prof. Stephen Doughty: “As we celebrate this momentous achievement as the first of many RUMC milestones we know that we are building upon more than 20 years of PMC’s high quality Irish education delivery. We continue to support the development of healthcare in Malaysia and were delighted to recently sign a MoU with the Ministry of Health to establish a new pathway for Family Medicine training for doctors in Malaysia.”

The University is committed to offer more high quality, internationally recognised programmes to cater to the growing demands in the global healthcare sector. 

Established for more than 20 years ago, the institution provided Malaysia’s first registrable medical degree from a Malaysian private higher education institution and is owned by Irish institutions, the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) and University College Dublin (UCD). Degrees are awarded by the National University of Ireland and are globally recognised. RUMC will continue to build on this history and will offer a high-quality Irish medical degree as well as other healthcare and related programmes at foundation, bachelors, masters and doctoral levels.

The event today was attended by many in the healthcare and education sector RUMC staff and students joined in the celebration.

The newly launched institution will be better placed to inform the profession and the public about medicine, especially through hosting the prestigious Cochrane Malaysia network which focusses on dissemination of evidence-based medicine. In addition, future plans to continue to increase research activity and output will ensure that Malaysia stays at the cutting edge of medicine development. Core activities will remain as providing high quality, affordable Irish medical education in Malaysia and ensuring that our location in the northern corridor supports the region and its development.

Nearly 1,700 medical doctors have graduated from the institution with globally recognised medical degrees of the National University of Ireland (NUI) and practice in Malaysia, Brunei, Singapore, Ireland, UK, Switzerland, Malta, Australia, New Zealand, USA and many other countries. The graduating class of 2019 will be the first to graduate under the new University name.

For more information, please visit the RUMC website or follow on Facebook.

About RCSI

Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) is ranked among the top 250 (top 2%) of universities worldwide in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings (2018) and its research is ranked first in Ireland for citations. It is an international not-for-profit health sciences institution, with its headquarters in Dublin, focused on education and research to drive improvements in human health worldwide. RCSI is a signatory of the Athena SWAN Charter.

About UCD

University College Dublin (UCD) is one of Europe's leading research-intensive universities and is currently ranked within the top 1% of institutions worldwide. UCD is also Ireland's most globally engaged university with over 30,000 students drawn from over 120 countries and includes 5,500 students based at locations outside of Ireland. The University's main Dublin campus occupies an extensive parkland estate of more than 130 hectares and offers world-leading facilities.

About RCSI & UCD Malaysia Campus (RUMC formerly PMC)

Wholly owned by the RCSI and UCD, the University has been providing the highest quality medical education to internationally recognised standards since the institution’s inception in 1996. The core medical degree programme takes students to the RCSI or UCD in Dublin, Ireland for the pre-clinical years and then to RUMC and its Teaching Hospitals in and around Penang for their clinical training years prior to graduation. Graduates are awarded medical degrees of the National University of Ireland, which are recognised worldwide.