USU PR - Universitas Sumatera Utara (USU) signed a memorandum of understanding with the National University of Singapore (NUS) and Singapore Health Services PTE LTD in the Rector's Audience Room on Thursday (20/07/2023).

USU Rector Prof. Dr. Muryanto Amin, S.Sos, M.Si said the signing of this memorandum of understanding includes several important points such as joint research and publications, exchange of documentation, research materials, publications, and information in areas of mutual interest, development, organization and holding of academic symposia, designing university project development, and various other activities that have a sustainable impact on the environment and the world community.

In line with that, the USU Rector expects this cooperation to strengthen the quality of academic services and education at USU, especially in the health sector.

“We are grateful and welcome the partnership between the National University of Singapore and Singapore Health Services PTE LTD with Universitas Sumatera Utara, which is expected to enhance the quality of academic services and the quality of education at Universitas Sumatera Utara, particularly in the field of health/medicine," USU's Rector stated..

Vice Rector III Prof. Dr. Poppy Anjelisa Zaitun Hasibuan, M.Si., Apt. said that the internationalization of this campus affects the university because this program involves three institutions.

"Hopefully, it will be very influential because this program is from SingHealth and the Duke Dean NUS Medical School. So it involves three institutions, from USU, SingHealth, and Dean Duke NUS," said Prof Poppy.

On the same occasion, the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Prof. Dr. Aldy Safruddin Rambe, Sp.S(K), said that USU's cooperation with SingHealth covers various fields ranging from research collaboration, student exchange, and later there will be the opening of the SingHealth Regional Office at USU.

"The cooperation between USU and SingHealth has been ongoing for several years. This is a new MoU. We cooperate in various fields ranging from research collaboration, student exchange, and placement of our staff to study there. Hopefully, the opening of the SingHealth Regional Office at USU can be realized," said the Dean of FK.

The signing of the MoU was attended by the Dean of Duke-NUS Medical School, Prof Thomas Coffman, Group Chief Executive Officer of SingHealth, Prof Ivy Ng, and Director of SingHealth Duke-NUS Global Health Institute, Prof Tan Hiang Khoon.

Professor Tan Hiang Khoon highly welcomed the partnership. According to him, this partnership is different from previous ones, and SingHealth Duke NUS's first time having a constant platform that allows it to run more programs and fully contribute to their implementation.

"It's different when we have a constant platform that allows us to have more programs, and we also see the source of our full contribution to make it happen. So we believe this is a big step up from what happened in the past, which has done a lot," said Prof Tan Hiang Khoon.

On the same occasion, Prof Thomas Coffman said the collaboration is an opportunity for students and faculty to help each other strengthen health care to improve health security.

"To improve safety, we work together," said Prof Thomas.

On the other hand, Prof. Ivy Ng explained that healthcare organizations around the world face many challenges, hence the importance of this collaboration by developing collective wisdom and bringing new knowledge to the forefront so that in the future, we can build better diagnosis, treatment, and outcomes for patients in Indonesia and Singapore.

"I think healthcare organizations worldwide are facing many challenges for us with the emergence, inspections, chronic diseases, population agents, new technologies, and many other areas," Prof. Ivy explained.