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Minister of Health Nguyen Thi Kim Tien threw her support behind a proposal to include literature in the entrance exam for medical universities.

The proposal was addressed at the meeting of deans of medical universities in Hanoi on October 10. Minister Nguyen Thi Kim Tien said that, because students must take one of four groupings of university admission examinations, they tend to focus on studying subjects in these groups and lack knowledge in other areas.

"Even some state officials use bad grammar while creating documents. I've joked with them, saying it would be easy to have a stroke reading these documents," she said.

According to the minister, instead of holding a separate entrance exams, medical universities could use the scores from high school graduation exams to choose students. Since math, literature and a foreign language are mandatory, medical universities would only need to choose one more subject such as chemistry or biology.

Nguyen Minh Thuyet, former deputy chair of the NA Committee for Culture, Education, Youth and Children, said better use of language will help doctors in their thinking processes and to better communicate with their patients. He said, "Literature can also help doctors be more sympathetic with their patients."

One teacher of literature at Tran Phu High School approves of the proposal, but according to her, literature should not be the main subject. Students with good marks in literature should be prioritised, but making literature into one of the four main subjects would only put pressure on students. "This plan can be implemented in 2016, and we can gradually raise the benchmarks for literature in the future."

Nguyen Duc Hinh, dean of Hanoi Medical University, agreed that several years of preparation would be needed before the plan can be carried out. Detailed enrollment schemes will be discussed at another meeting of deans of medical universities this December.