Prevalence of HIV in the Mthatha area of South Africa, as estimated from the testing of rape victims.

Background: Tremendous challenges remain in the field of HIV education, prevention and care in South Africa. There is conflicting data on the prevalence of HIV in South Africa from two major studies. Antenatal surveillance showed 29.

Addressing social responsibility in medical education: the African way.

Indigenous sub-Saharan societies have, over the millennia, lived and socialised within the unwritten 'rules' of the 'Ubuntu' or similar philosophies that emphasises holistic 'humanness', and which is a form of 'social responsibility'. This article looks into some relevant social responsibility aspects of medical education in the South African context, with particular emphasis on how these aspects have been addressed. Apartheid was, by its very nature, incompatible with social responsibility for the majority of South Africans, but one medical school that was a non-complicit product of apartheid succeeded in fulfilling a socially responsible mission.

Problem-based learning improves the academic performance of medical students in South Africa.

Objectives: To compare the academic performance of students on the previous, classical, discipline- and lecture-based, traditional curriculum with that of subsequent students who followed an innovative, problem- and community-based curriculum.

Methods: This was a retrospective study that analysed the records of students who enrolled on the doctor training programme between 1985 and 1995, and the records of students who graduated from the programme between 1989 and 2002.

Outcomes: The educational outcomes assessed were the attrition and graduation rates on the traditional curriculum and those on the innovative curriculum.