Are you telling me that the Ministry of Higher Education did not realise the number of students in Egypt? ONLY now they seem to know that the number of students studying in Egypt is unimaginable and have decided to check on their quality etc. There are almost > 10 000 students in Egypt with almost > 5000 of them doing medicine, that’s about 1000/year. MARA started to send students to Egypt over the last few years and this was followed by JPA. It was mainly to cut cost as sending students to UK, Ireland and Australia was beginning to get very expensive. Thus they started to send to Egypt, Poland, Moscow, Jordan, Indonesia and even Turkey. I can’t comment much on the quality of their graduates as I have not seen or supervised anyone of them.
However I have worked with some of their Egyptian specialists before, way back in 2003-2005. There were good ones as well as bad ones. Most of the good ones left in about 2 years due to frustration that they felt on the ground. They felt cheated by the government as they were told many juicy stories about the health system in this country. Imagine they were told that the cost of living in Malaysia for the whole family is only RM 1000/month and that we have Ultrasound and CT Scans in all our hospitals! Many of the good ones felt that the amount of money they got were not worth the effort and workload. Communication was another issue.
Unfortunately our MOH is trying the same stunt again, if you read below. MOH is going to negotiate with the government of Egypt/India and Sri Lanka to get the “Cream of the crop” specialist from these countries to work in our district hospitals. First of all, the ” Cream of the Crops” will either be happy working in their own country or would have left to US, Australia and UK. So, the specialist that we will be recruiting will be the rejected or second class ones. That was what happened 10 years ago. We had surgeons who were unable to operate!
Communication is a major problem with these specialist. They can speak English of course but not many of our rural patients can speak English!!, thanks to our education policy! How are you going to function as a doctor if you can’t communicate? Our nurses are equally bad at speaking English and thus would not be a good interpreter. I remember an Egyptian specialist using a nurse to translate and the translation was way out and the patient did not understand at all what the hell was going on!
Well, I hope the MOH will not make the same mistake they made 8 years ago!
Non-objection certs for studies in Egypt put on hold
KUCHING: The Higher Education Department has temporarily frozen the issuance of Non-Objection Certificate (NOC) to new students wanting to pursue their studies in Egypt.Minister Datuk Seri Mohamed Khaled Nordin said the move was part of the department’s efforts to re-evaluate the quality of courses offered by several universities in Egypt, besides the appalling lax in security there.”Right now, we are freezing the issuance of the NOC and the department will send its officials to Egypt soon to re-evaluate the quality of courses offered by several universities there, especially in the faculty of medicine,” he told reporters.He was commenting on developments involving Malaysian students who had to postpone their studies, following the political unrest in Egypt.He said the department’s officials would also convene discussions with the relevant universities in Egypt on the possibility of allowing the students to temporarily continue their studies at local universities in Malaysia.About 5,000 out of 11,000 Malaysian students in Egypt are studying medicine.
Meanwhile, up to 4,281 Malaysians have been evacuated from Egypt so far, including 451 who flew in to KL International Airport by MAS at 2.20am Friday.
A Foreign Ministry spokesman said 268 more Malaysians were expected to fly into Changi International Airport in Singapore via Saudi Airlines Flight SV838 at 3.30 pm. Saudi Airlines do have a direct service to Malaysia.
“Buses will be provided to transport the passengers from the airport to bus terminals in Larkin, Melaka Central, Seremban and Serdang,” she said.
A Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) C-130 aircraft carrying 100 Malaysians was also scheduled to arrive at the RMAF base in Subang Friday.
Govt negotiating to get specialist doctors from Egypt, India and Sri Lanka
KEMAMAN: In a bid to address the shortage of specialist doctors in rural hospitals, the Health Ministry is in the midst of negotiating with its counterparts in Egypt, India and Sri Lanka to source a pool of specialist doctors.
Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai said Saturday that it would be a government-to-government arrangement.
Egypt had sent a list of 58 specialists but the recent turmoil in that country had put the matter on hold. It would be revisited once the situation normalises, he said.
Liow said he would be visiting India in March and the list from that country would be finalised then.
Turmoil in Egypt delays arrival of specialists
KEMAMAN: The turmoil in Egypt has delayed the arrival of 58 specialists from the country, said Health Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai.
“The matter will be revisited once the situation normalises,” he said, adding that he would also be visiting India and Sri Lanka in March to finalise the list of specialists who would be coming from these countries.
Liow, who visited the Kemaman Hospital here, said the ministry would only select the cream of the crop among medical practitioners from all three countries.
“We want the best for our hospitals, thus we decided to hold talks directly with government officials from these countries without sourcing the specialists privately.
“Through this arrangement, recognised foreign specialists can opt to serve in Malaysia for about two years without losing their seniority upon returning to their countries,” he said.
Liow revealed that this was a short-term measure to address the shortage of specialists in rural hospitals and alleviate the heavy workload at major government medical institutions due to the high number of patients who need specialised health care.
Liow also announced that his ministry had approved a RM10mil allocation to improve facilities and equipment at Kemaman Hospital.
He said the ministry had also given the nod for the construction of a specialist hospital in Kijal.
Pagalavan's Avatar 
1000/year from Egypt alone. At least another 2000/year from India/Pakistan/Bangladesh/Indonesia/Romania/Russia/Ukraine/Czech Republic/Taiwan/China … add this to the 4000/year from local public and private unis …. 7000 per year new doctors.
People still think there’s no glut?
It will be more than that. I think it will hit 8000 by 2015! Already 6000 last year!
well… im shocked tat Kijal is goin to hv a speciialist hosp thr… whn Hosp kemaman is merely less than 20 min away….thr r only 1-2 specialists in hosp kemaman and tell me about it.. even the specialists in kuala terengganu refused to work in kemaman… tsk tsk tsk
Today Chinese newspaper (kwongwah) start reporting the poor quality of ours 3000 houseman especially from the Ukraine. They don’t even know how to take BP, measure pulse and heart rate. How depressing….
http://www.kwongwah.com.my/news/2011/02/15/114.html
(This is the chinese newspaper link)
Thanks for the info. It is very worrying………………….
where the hack they put there ukraine??? go and read properly dont simply put..it stated Russia there not specifically ukraine..
Thanks maddy for the correction
please be sure what you stating there…your words can cause chaos among students..dont think because its in mandarin people wont read..dats really depressing to noe exist some people simply creating rumour without reading the news properly..
Blood pressure of foreign medical graduates will also be questioned
At 17:45 on February 15, 2011
(Kuala Lumpur, the 15th hearing) more than 3,000, in particular, is a graduate of a foreign, in government hospitals in the “Apprentice” training the interns of the medical technology, because some people are not proficient in basic health screening procedures have been questioned.
This includes measuring blood pressure, heart rate and pulse check, and medical students should master before graduation real diagnosis.
Most graduated from Russian universities
It is understood that most of the problems students are graduated from foreign universities, especially by the Malaysian Qualifications Agency (MQA) and the Malaysian Medical Council (MMC) recognized by the Russian universities.
December last year, the 41 government hospitals, training of medical personnel in the student interns have 3252 people, or more than 1290 people in 2007 to increase double.
Medical sources say the problem occurs because the lack of correlation of more than 340, subject to government supervision and recognition of foreign university.
The message said: “If the local colleges and universities are monitoring every 5 years, why not be recognized by the equal treatment of foreign universities. This defect may cause a problem with the interns there, because no standard curriculum.”
Public Health Association of Malaysia president Datuk Dr Professor Mo Hamo Race benefits that, in addition to foreign universities need to be more stringent certification standards and enhanced to ensure that graduates have a certain level, the proposed special examination before their internship.
Several respondents also pointed out that medical officers, most of the interns have graduated from the Russian problem.
Interns from local universities for oversight by the Malaysian Medical Council, so there is not much problem, other European countries, interns, such as Britain, Ireland and even the United States there is no problem, because of their higher standard.
yeah its like you can make another malaysia there in egypt….. there’s too many of them… and i’m not aware of that coz no one ever told me they were that many!!!!
at least the MOH has done something to get the specialist to Malaysia..
this will never happened if those local specialist stays in goverment service and serve the nation..
True. But MOH are also the cause of the problem to a certain extent. Poor pay along with discrimination in the workforce will cause specialists to leave the government service. Having said that, there are some that would have left regardless because of the financial attraction of private practice.
Well, if the government has taken care of the specialist well, this would not have happened. If you ask most of the specialist who left gov service, many of them will tell you that they left because of frustration of the system and money was not the main reason!
Too many of my colleague friends are now working oversea after they finish their postgrade studies. Why is it that we are importing specialist from oversea but not putting more effort in inviting our specialist back. This is frustrating. Please enlighten me.
As someone who is at the end of their postgrad training overseas, I can tell you what will help me come back as a specialist:
1. Better pay – this need not be the same as what I earn now, but a specialist in Malaysia should be earning close to RM 20,000 per month as a starting basic pay.
2. Promotion based on merit – why won’t people learn that healthcare (and education – look at the public unis!) is too important to base promotion on race?
3. Some recognition of the fact that I may spend 5-10 years in a city/town where I don’t really want to be and have no connection to. Overseas, I can choose where I work.
4. More say in appointing MOs in the department I work, as opposed to just receiving whoever the Pengarah sends or whoever has pulled the strongest cables.
There will be some who will leave the govt service anyway because they can never have enough money, but I believe the govt can overcome that easily by creating a better working environment in the public sector.