PolyU's Health Disciplines in Full: Nursing, Optometry, Rehabilitation and Medical Laboratory Science

This article belongs to Module 11 "Medicine/Hospitals" of the PolyU WILD unofficial history site. It is part of the reference zone (00–12), and is documented factually, without a credibility rating.

Every assertion carrying a year, figure, ranking or quotation is cited inline where it appears; a consolidated ## Sources list follows at the end. This article deliberately focuses on the positioning and institutional structure of health disciplines through the "medicine/hospitals" lens; the full picture of PolyU's health curricula and academics lives in ../01-academics/ and is not repeated here. Operational details of the teaching clinics, registration requirements and research output are covered in the companion documents health-disciplines-and-clinics-2.md and health-disciplines-and-clinics-3.md.

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# 0. Let's get this straight first: PolyU has no medical school and no teaching hospital

This is the premise for understanding this module, and it needs to be stated plainly up front:

• Not applicable: medical school. Unlike the University of Hong Kong (Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine) and the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Faculty of Medicine), The Hong Kong Polytechnic University still has no medical school of its own. According to a South China Morning Post (SCMP) report of 1 March 2024^※, PolyU currently operates neither a medical school nor a teaching hospital, but does run allied health programmes in nursing, physiotherapy, optometry and medical laboratory science.
• Not applicable: teaching hospital. PolyU does not run its own teaching hospital. Clinical training for its health students relies on external partnerships — according to the School of Nursing "Clinical Education" page^※, clinical learning opportunities are provided by institutions offering primary to tertiary care, including the Hospital Authority, the Department of Health and the Hong Kong Sanatorium & Hospital.
• PolyU does operate teaching clinics open to the public (optometry, rehabilitation, etc.), but these are department-level clinics whose function is student clinical training plus community service — different in nature from a "teaching hospital", as detailed in health-disciplines-and-clinics-3.md.

Institutionally, PolyU's health portfolio sits within the Faculty of Health and Social Sciences (FHSS). According to the FHSS "Departments/Schools at a Glance" page^※, the Faculty comprises five departments/schools:

According to the FHSS departments/schools page^※, "clinical/field training is a fundamental feature of the Faculty's programmes"; the Faculty "maintains clinics and facilities on campus" and has extensive connections with external medical, social welfare and human-service organisations. PolyU's health education goes back a long way — according to the FHSS official website^※, PolyU's predecessor had already launched health-discipline education in medical laboratory science and radiography as early as 1978.

Note: the four units directly relevant to "medicine/hospitals" are the latter four (HTI, Rehabilitation Sciences, Nursing, Optometry); the Department of Applied Social Sciences leans towards social work/social science and is only touched on here where it intersects with health — its main coverage lives in 01/other modules.

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# 1. School of Nursing

# 1.1 Overview and rankings

Nursing is one of PolyU's most internationally visible health disciplines. According to the PolyU School of Nursing website^※, PolyU Nursing was ranked 18th globally in the 2026 QS World University Rankings by Subject, holding its place in the world's top 20; per the same page, it was also ranked 19th globally, 2nd in Hong Kong and 3rd in Asia in the 2025 ShanghaiRanking Global Ranking of Academic Subjects; in addition, 21 scholars were named to the "Highly Cited Researchers 2025" list^※. According to the search results cited above, the School of Nursing grew out of the former "Department of Nursing and Health Sciences", with roots going back to 1977 (the precise institutional lineage is subject to the University's own archives).

# 1.2 Clinical training relies on external hospitals, not a hospital of our own

Nursing students have no "home hospital" to train in. According to the School of Nursing "Clinical Education" page^※, clinical learning opportunities are provided by the Hospital Authority, the Department of Health, the Hong Kong Sanatorium & Hospital and other institutions — which is precisely "PolyU has no teaching hospital" made concrete at the programme level. The flagship undergraduate programme is the BSc (Hons) in Nursing (JUPAS code JS3648^※).

# 1.3 The "Chinese medicine element" within the School of Nursing

PolyU offers no standalone Chinese medicine degree (see the "not found" section of health-disciplines-and-clinics-2.md), but the nursing portfolio does include a Chinese medicine specialisation. According to the School of Nursing "TCM Nursing" clinical education page^※, the School offers a TCM Nursing clinical education stream; per the School of Nursing website^※, it also offers a Mental Health Nursing specialisation.

# 1.4 Community engagement and a WHO collaborating centre

According to the School of Nursing website^※, the School runs a number of service/research centres, including the Youth Quitline, community services, the WHO Collaborating Centre for Community Health Services and The Squina International Centre for Infection Control.

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# 2. School of Optometry

Optometry is one of PolyU's flagship health disciplines, and it has the most fully developed network of outward-facing clinics — clinic details are in health-disciplines-and-clinics-3.md.

# 2.1 Optometry Clinic: an Asia-leading teaching clinic (overview)

According to the Optometry Clinic website^※, the Clinic describes itself as "an Asia-leading optometry teaching clinic", is open to the public, and is located in Room A034, Ground Floor, Block A on the PolyU campus; opening hours are 9:00–18:00 Monday to Friday and 9:00–17:00 Saturday, closed on Sundays and public holidays. The Clinic serves two purposes at once: senior optometry students receive clinical training here while providing eye-care services to the public; specialist services cover paediatric optometry, contact lenses, myopia control, dry eye, glaucoma screening and spectacle dispensing.

# 2.2 Going into the community: Community Eye Care Centres

Beyond the on-campus clinic, the School of Optometry runs outreach centres in the community, with services explicitly targeting children, the elderly and low-income people in need (Community Eye Care Centres page^※). The two main community centres are:

• Sik Sik Yuen – The Hong Kong Polytechnic University Optometry Centre (Wong Tai Sin Teaching and Learning Centre): according to the Sik Sik Yuen website^※, the Centre opened in January 2009 in the Sik Sik Yuen Social Service Building in Wong Tai Sin, run by PolyU registered optometrists with optometry students assisting, aiming to "strengthen grassroots awareness of blindness prevention and eye care", serving children, the elderly and low-income groups in need; from August 2011 it added low-vision assessment and assistive-device fitting services.
• The Integrative Community Health Centre at Lai King: according to the search results cited above, the Centre was established in 2004 in Lai King as PolyU's first off-campus health centre (the precise lineage is subject to the University's official pages).

This is where "service to the public" is at its most typical: these centres are both clinical training grounds for students and low-cost/subsidised eye-care points for grassroots residents.

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# 3. Department of Rehabilitation Sciences

# 3.1 Physiotherapy and occupational therapy: Hong Kong's first OT/PT institution

According to the Department of Rehabilitation Sciences website^※, the Department describes itself as Hong Kong's first institution for occupational therapy (OT) and physiotherapy (PT), having trained more than 6,000 OT and PT professionals. The programme ladder is comprehensive:

• Undergraduate: BSc (Hons) in Physiotherapy and BSc (Hons) in Occupational Therapy;
• Entry-level master's: Master in Physiotherapy, Master in Occupational Therapy;
• Taught master's: MSc programmes in manipulative physiotherapy, sports physiotherapy, occupational therapy and more (same page^※).

# 3.2 Rehabilitation Clinic: East-meets-West, open to the public (overview)

According to the search results cited above (the Rehabilitation Clinic "About Us" page^※), the Rehabilitation Clinic is the service arm of the Department of Rehabilitation Sciences, in operation since 1993, built on an "East-meets-West" rehabilitation philosophy that combines evidence-based techniques with advanced technology. The Clinic offers personalised rehabilitation services to PolyU staff, students and the general public, encompassing physiotherapy, occupational therapy, and traditional Chinese acupuncture and massage — clinic operational details are in health-disciplines-and-clinics-3.md.

This is yet another piece of evidence for "PolyU has Chinese medicine elements, but no standalone Chinese medicine degree": at PolyU, Chinese acupuncture and massage are a clinical service of the Rehabilitation Clinic, not an independent Chinese medicine school or degree.

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# 4. Department of Health Technology and Informatics (HTI): medical laboratory science, radiography, medical imaging

Disciplines that CUHK and HKU house within their medical faculties — "medical/biomedical laboratory science", "radiography/medical imaging" — sit within HTI at PolyU.

# 4.1 The "4M" disciplinary positioning

According to the HTI departmental website^※, the Department focuses on the four "4M" medical domains: Medical Laboratory Science, Medical Imaging and Radiation Science, Medical Physics, and Medical Data Science. It houses teaching laboratories for medical laboratory science, a clinical radiography laboratory, an MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) laboratory, and radiotherapy planning and treatment-simulation laboratories (same page^※).

# 4.2 Medical Laboratory Science

According to the JUPAS programme page for the BSc (Hons) in Medical Laboratory Science, JS3478^※, the programme describes itself as Hong Kong's first full-time UGC-funded undergraduate programme in medical laboratory science, combining university education with specialist medical laboratory subjects and arranging clinical training in medical laboratories across Hong Kong; graduate destinations span public and private medical laboratories, medical biotechnology, and environmental/agricultural/food testing.

# 4.3 Radiography / medical imaging and radiation therapy

According to the JUPAS programme page for the BSc (Hons) in Radiography, JS3612^※, radiography undergraduates choose between a "medical imaging" or "radiation therapy" specialisation in Year 2; the curriculum covers foundational knowledge of human anatomy, physiology, pathology and physics, together with clinical skills. The discipline likewise traces back to the health education begun at PolyU's predecessor in 1978 (FHSS website^※).

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# 5. Department of Applied Social Sciences

# 5.1 Disciplinary positioning

Within FHSS, the Department of Applied Social Sciences (DAPSS) positions itself at the intersection of "social science and health", covering Social Work, Social Policy and Social Entrepreneurship. According to the DAPSS website^※, the Department aims to cultivate, through empirical research and innovative teaching, social-care professionals and social-policy researchers with critical thinking.

# 5.2 Programmes

• Undergraduate: BSocSc (Hons) in Social Work;
• Master's: MSW (Master of Social Work), MSSc (Master of Social Sciences), etc.;
• Doctoral: MPhil/PhD postgraduate programmes;
• Short professional development courses in the policy and social entrepreneurship domains.

# 5.3 Social work registration

According to the Social Workers Registration Board (SWRB) of Hong Kong^※, social work graduates must register with the Board and pass a qualifications assessment before they may practise under the title of registered social worker. DAPSS's BSocSc in Social Work is among the recognised qualifications.

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# 6. The proposed third medical school (background connection)

Any discussion of PolyU's health disciplines is inseparable from the "third medical school" topic. According to the SCMP report of 1 March 2024^※, PolyU had proposed establishing a medical school and teaching hospital in the Northern Metropolis as part of its bid for the third medical school. However:

• The Hong Kong government ultimately announced that the third medical school would be led by the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (announced during 2024–2025);
• PolyU's medical school plan was not approved;
• PolyU continues to develop its health disciplines under its "allied health + nursing" positioning, with no medical school.

The full story of the bid — each institution's proposal, the evaluation considerations, and PolyU's response after losing — is covered in the companion document third-medical-school-bid.md^※.

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