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Background: The recognition of medical professionalism as a complex social construct makes context, geographical location and culture important considerations in any discussion of professional behaviour. Medical students, medical educators and practitioners are now much more on the move globally, exposing them to cultural and social attitudes, values and beliefs that may differ from their own traditional perceptions of professionalism. Aims and Methods: This paper uses the model of the intercultural development continuum and the concept of 'cultural fit' to discuss what might transpire when a student, teacher or doctor is faced with a new cultural environment. Using our own experiences as medical educators working abroad and supported by evidence in the literature, we have developed four anecdotal scenarios to highlight some of the challenges that different cultural contexts bring to our current (Western) understanding of professionalism. Results and Conclusions: The scenarios highlight some of the potentially different regional and/or cultural perspectives and nuances of professional behaviours, attitudes or values that many of us either take for granted or find difficult, depending on our training and socio-cultural upbringing. With this paper, we hope to start a long overdue conversation about global professionalism amongst medical educators, identify potential areas for research and highlight a need for medical schools to embrace a 'global' approach to how professionalism is embedded in their curricula. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rationale: Public health and preventive medicine (PHPM) has been recognized internationally as a physician specialty, but national parallels and differences exist between training contexts. This paper reviews PHPM training and employment in Canada, France, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the USA. Methods: Information gathered from relevant accreditation bodies and literature searches was used to create descriptive profiles of national training demographics and structure and a narrative outlining trends and challenges facing the specialty. Results: Notable similarities and differences exist between national contexts. Key themes were differences in training strategies and practice scope, specialty stakeholders, certification structure, and funding. Recognition challenges faced the specialty across all six countries. Other challenges included unclear competencies and training strategies and a need for PHPM specialists to highlight their role in combating population health threats. Additional differences existed between comparator countries on the structure of training, funding sources for training programs, availability of training posts, and linkages with other physician specialties. Conclusion: Highlighting these themes is a first step to fostering training collaborations between PHPM specialist physicians to augment transnational action on global public health challenges and also supports PHPM physician educators with innovative solutions from abroad that might address domestic specialty challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]