Since then it has become a favourite elective destination for British medical students particularly from the London Medical schools, Newcastle, Leeds, Liverpool, Glasgow, Southampton, Hull & York, Peninsular as well as medical schools in Germany & Denmark. Elective students from UK, Australia & New Zealand started to come regularly after 1987 when the department of medicine was headed by Dr Chew Peng Hong.
SGH is also a popular place for elective attachment for medical students. During his tenure Dr Chew had managed to get the department to achieve international standards for which he received numerous awards from the State Government of Sarawak, the Federal Government & the ministry of health. In 2006 the Federal Government recognised his selfless contribution to medicine in Sarawak in particular & Malaysia in general conferred on him by the Agong ( the Malaysian King) the honorific of PJN which carries the title of Datuk. For his contribution the University appointed him adjunct Professor of Medicine till to date. of medicine of the hospital & by the time he retired in 2003' he had set up the following subspecialties in Medicine: nephrology, dermatology, neurology, rheumatology, chest medicine, cardiology, infectious diseases.gastro-enterology, haematology besides playing a major & key role in helping plan a brand new medical school, The School Of Medicine & Health Sciences of the University of Malaysia, Sarawak, which uses SGH as its teaching hospital. In August of that year Dr Chew Peng Hong was transferred to head the dept. In Medicine, prior to 1987 there was only the department of general medicine with 3 general physicians.