The primary objective of the Department of Parasitology is to qualify physicians who are capable of coping with the rapid changes in the healthcare needs of Saudi Arabia through the following:

• Paying attention and focusing on the strategy of self-study.
• Using new methods in teaching that have proven successful internationally in the field of medical education.
• The academic courses are offered by a multidisciplinary team of basic sciences specialists and clinical physicians.
• Students are availed with opportunities for early exposure to clinical applications to put them in direct contact with real and virtual patients at an early stage, and interact with the students' personal and academic needs in a scientific planned manner.
• Provision of an effective system to develop the performance of healthcare employees in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, as well as ongoing review and development.
• Equipping students with self-confidence and the ability to address the public, through the presentations and explanations that are prepared and delivered by the students themselves.
• Preparing and designing the scientific curriculum taught by the department, in terms of modules based on the body organs, so each cognitive module will cover one of the vital systems of the body. Such modules should be designed and taught by a multidisciplinary team of science professors from different disciplines suitable to each academic curriculum being taught and the vital body systems and organs it covers.
• The educational plan encompasses discussion sessions that give students full freedom to discover and study pathological cases by themselves, achieve self-learning goals from each case, and evaluate students in a harmonized manner based on the learning outcomes.

Department's Activities:

• The academic staff of the Department of Medical Parasitology seeks to build a specialized team in parasitic diseases and the ways of combating them to serve the community, upgrade the level of specialized competency in the field of tropical medicine, provide educational programs for students of bachelor and postgraduate degrees, deliver awareness-raising lectures, and publish research in their respective specialized fields.
• The department has begun active participation in environmental health research with the departments concerned to investigate and explore the dangers of using wastewater in irrigation and its impact on environmental health.
• The department has conducted some statistical studies of gastrointestinal diseases prevailing in Makkah Al Mukarramah, and the rate of bacteremia amongst pregnant women and mental health patients.
• The department has also carried out extensive studies to assess the quality of diagnosis of parasitic disease in the laboratories of Makkah Al Mukarramah.
• The department is engaged in significant activity in the study and diagnosis of malaria using advanced immunological and molecular methods.

Educational Laboratories:

• There is an educational laboratory of the highest standard in the male section, which is located in the College of Pharmacy building.
• There are also two educational laboratories in the female section, and each laboratory has one preparation room.
• The department has furnished the laboratories in order to meet the needs of the students of both programs in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and the Department of Medicine and Surgery.
• The department has provided specimen slides for teaching purposes for various types of parasites in all phases.

Medical Research Laboratories:

The UQU Department of Medical Parasitology has two main laboratories, one for general diagnostic research and the other for molecular diagnostic research, and strenuous effort is being exerted to modernize these laboratories.

The department has also equipped and furnished a special office for research students. The department hopes, through the research conducted, to play an active role in serving this edifice that will, in the near future, be a global reference for community service, and be ready to receive pathological samples from hospitals and private and public clinics, to establish a diagnosis reference laboratory benefiting Makkah health facilities and serving pilgrims during the Hajj and Umrah seasons.