[How should we establish professional education system for neurologists?]

A professional education system for neurologists has been provided at Department of Neurology, Niigata University, which includes neurophysiology, neuroradiology, and neuropathology (optional). A 6 month-course of "chief resident" has also been implemented in the program. Although these systems have functioned well, hospitals providing such education programs are limited. To encourage the education programs, various issues need to be discussed. 1. The number of staffs is limited in most of the hospitals, limiting the capacity for providing such programs. 2. We need to recruit at least a given number of neurologists to make such systems work properly. 3. We need to discuss on the relationship between professional education system for neurologists and programs in the graduate school. To establish standardized professional education system for neurologists in Japan, Japanese Society of Neurology is strongly encouraged to play major roles.