SWU teacher lands in top 10 of docs’ exam
-A A +ASaturday, February 23, 2013
A GRADUATE of a Cebu university has achieved the rare feat of landing in the top 10 of two licensure examinations nine years apart.
Michelle Jay Gonzales Francisco, 30, who graduated cum laude from the Southwestern University–Matias H. Aznar Memorial College of Medicine Inc. (SWU-MHAM-CM), placed ninth in the February 2013 Physician Licensure Examination.
In March 2004, she claimed the 10th spot in the medical technology board exam.
Francisco is among 420 medicine graduates who passed the exam out of the 863 who took it.
Francisco achieved a score of 83.67 percent, sharing the ninth place with Randell Santos Arias of Far Eastern University–Nicanor Reyes Medical Foundation and Vanessa Marie Violago Calabia of Our Lady of Fatima University–Valenzuela.
A University of Sto. Tomas graduate, Chicco Xerxes de Leon Pangan, topped the examinations with a score of 86.33 percent. Denver Francisco Sapo and Kristina Anne Balce Co, both from Our Lady of Fatima University–Valenzuela, came second.
Residency
Francisco said she plans to apply for an internal medicine residency at the Chong Hua Hospital, where she spent a year-long post-graduate internship.
Francisco was most outstanding medical technology intern and a Don Matias Aznar scholar.
Dr. Peter Aznar, SWU-MHAM-CM dean, said Francisco was a member of the medical technology faculty before she proceeded to medical school.
“The trademark of our students (is that) they work very hard,” Aznar said.
Francisco said her sister, a nurse in Riyadh, supported her and their mother, a literature evangelist and a gastric cancer survivor.
The results of the physician licensure examination were posted in the Professional Regulation Commission’s (PRC) website.
The PRC post said there were 32 SWU graduates who took the exam and 17 (53.13 percent) of them passed.
Aznar said the school has an average passing rate of 83.33 for first takers and 14.29 percent for repeaters.
To raise the passing rate, he said, SWU will implement more strict student admission policies.
Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on February 23, 2013.
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