Well, the Minister himself has finally acknowledged that there will be surplus of doctors soon (please read the 2nd last sentence) but of course, he claim that the moratorium is to prevent the surplus. However, as I have said before, I don’t think the moratorium is going to make any difference in preventing surplus of doctors in 5 years time. We already have about 4000 new doctors coming into the market last year. Remember, almost 50% on the 30 medical schools in the country have not even started to produce their graduates! Even if each produces 150 students , almost 4500 students will be graduating locally by 2015 but I am sure the number will be much higher as some public universities are already producing more than 200 students per year.

 

This news also confirms that you can do medicine wherever, including African, South American or eastern european countries and the government is not bothered! Getting NOC is a joke anyway. Some stupid clerk sitting in the MOHE will decide on the NOC! BUT what is for sure will be the Medical Licensing Exam(MQE) that every overseas graduate will have to pass before being eligible to be registered as a doctor. This is where a major problem will occur with substandard students may not even be able to get a job/practise as a doctor. I just hope that the MQE will be standardised and transparent enough. I won’t mind being one of the examiner thou!

 

However, I also feel that MMC need to be more strict on the local medical schools. If not I would prefer a similar exam for ALL local private and public medical graduates. I hope MMC will have more say and not to be a toothless tiger! One interesting thing that I recently noticed via the MMC website is the fact that Cyberjaya Medical University was derecognised by MMC as of 31/12/2010 based on the latest list dated 07/02/2011 (http://mmc.gov.my/v1/docs/Jadual%20Kedua%2011-02-07_Website.pdf). I was informed that the students were told that they have to sit for MQE  upon graduation if MMC do not reverse the decision by then!! I am sure more decisions like this will appear if a proper auditing is conducted on various medical schools in the country. Many of these medical schools are totally dependent on Burmese lecturers who don’t do any clinical work and part-time lecturers who just come for tutorials etc .

 

 Medical students now allowed to pick any varsities

Health Minister Liow Tiong Lai said one of the amendments would be the nullification of the Second Schedule which lists all the 375 recognised medical institutions.

Under this approach, the students would be able to choose the institutions of their choice, provided they obtain the “No Objection” certificate before hand from the Ministry of Higher Education, he said.

“After graduation, the students will have to sit for the Licensing Examination to determine their ability to function as quality and competent doctors,” he said when replying to a question from Dr Tan Seng Giaw (DAP-Kepong).

Liow said that students who passed the examination would be eligible to register with the Malaysian Medical Council (MMC) to serve as doctors in the country.

“It cannot be denied that it is difficult to conduct regular monitoring of the quality of medical studies by institutions abroad in view of the geographical and logistical factors and prohibitive cost involved in sending an evaluation panel overseas,” he said.

Liow said the moratorium on new medical programmes offered at local institutions of higher learning would come into force once it had been approved by parliament.

The moratorium, being worked out by the Ministry of Higher Education with input from relevant government agencies, was necessary to prevent the creation of a surplus of medical graduates, he said.

Liow also said that the number of medical graduands registered with the MMC had grown from 2,527 in 2008 to 3,150 in 2009 and to 3,257 last year.

– Bernama

As I have said from the beginning that this is a Malaysia Boleh phenomenon that will screw up the country in the future. We manage to add 27 medical schools in just < 15 years, probably the fastest in the world(we had 3 medical schools when IMU started in 1995) and currently the highest number of medical schools per capita of population!! Tan Sri Abu Bakar is right in what he is saying but he should have voiced out this issue long time ago but of course, no one would have listened to him anyway! Politicians make the decision in Malaysia and everyone just have to listen whether you like it or not. The 27 medical schools mentioned below does not include Perdana University, Premier University of Perak and Isaniah College, which means the number is actually 30!!!!!!. I do agree with him as well that with 30 medical colleges in Malaysia, why do we need to send students overseas for medicine (including JPA and MARA)?

Well, the health system in this country is going be screwed forever and it is not going to be easy to reverse the situation. Jobless and poorly trained doctor will become a reality and like most other developed countries in the world, people will then realise that doing medicine is not glamorous anymore. The income of each doctor will also gradually reduce whether in private or public sector. The good ones will continue to do well because of their reputation. The new ones will struggle even to get postgraduate training. Watch out for my latest article in Berita MMA which will be out soon.

Unhealthy growth of medical schools

KUALA LUMPUR: With too many medical schools, lack of teaching staff and insufficient training facilities, Malaysia is in danger of producing sub-standard medical graduates.Former director-general of health Tan Sri Dr Abu Bakar Suleiman said: “Too many medical schools have been allowed to be started in too short a time.”

He said this could become a problem when the country produced thousands of doctors who may not be as good “as they could be”.
“We don’t want numbers. We want quality: quality of medical schools, quality of medical graduates, quality of post-graduates. What we should be doing is working hard to make sure our medical schools are of international standard.”

Commenting on the mushrooming of medical schools and the low quality of medical graduates, Dr Abu Bakar, who was D-G of health from 1991 to 2001, said the the authorities needed to consider the country’s health planning when setting up medical schools.

“During my time, we used to advise the Education Ministry (the authority for higher education before the setting up of the Higher Education Ministry) on the formation of new medical schools, based on the country’s health planning needs.
“There was coordination in terms of what was needed and what was the production capacity.

“For example, whenever there was a request for a medical school to be formed, the ministry would enquire which hospital would be used for training. The prospective universities would come to us and we would discuss with them what they were going to do.

“We allocated hospitals to them so that they had facilities for training and clinical experience. Without that, they could not go to the ministry to consider their application. They had to consult the ministry before it could get the approval.
“That was how it was when universities such as Sheffield, International Medical University and Monash set up their medical schools. It was difficult to get a medical school licence then. But now it appears that this link between the Health Ministry and the Higher Education Ministry in terms of manpower needs is not there.”

Dr Abu Bakar, who is now IMU president, said co-ordination between the authorities was important, otherwise, the process of educating doctorswould not be done in a way that met the standards of local and foreign universities.

“Too many public universities are also being built too quickly and this is not healthy. There are too many housemen now, so supervising them can be difficult. And we worry they may not get adequate training.”

He said producing 20-odd medical schools in fewer than 10 years did not make sense, adding that there was a need for the authorities to justify the existence of these schools through evidence-based decision making.

“At present, every state wants to have a medical school. But is there a need? Some don’t even have enough training hospitals.”

Having too many medical schools also results in difficulties in recruiting academic staff, who are in short supply locally and abroad.

He said even IMU, which has been in the industry for 19 years, found it difficult to recruit the right staff, adding that although a doctor may be a specialist, he may not necessarily make a good academic.

“We need experienced people with academic management skills, curriculum planning, assessment, benchmarking and accreditation.”

On the quality of students pursuing medical studies, Dr Abu Bakar said while good grades were important criteria for entry to medical schools, students should also have the aptitude and desire to serve the community.

“The essence of being a doctor is to serve. Just because you are a bright student doesn’t make you a good doctor.

“You must have other attributes such as being interested in people, the desire to help others, patience, and the independence of thinking and learning,”

He added that he had come across cases of intelligent students not doing well in their medical exams because of a lack of interest.

“Some students graduate but they don’t want to practise because they are not interested in medicine; they took it up only because of pressure from their parents.”

Those intending to pursue medical studies, he added, should opt for local public and private medical schools, especially in terms of meeting the local needs, failing which they should consider medical schools in the Commonwealth countries or the United States, which have a similar healthcare system to Malaysia .

He advised them to avoid studying medicine in other countries where the healthcare system was different than that of Malaysia.

“If you send them to Russia or the Ukraine, they are trained to perform in the healthcare system of their host country, which is not similar to the system here. I have reservations about that. But that does not mean they cannot perform.

“And why do you need to send them to other places where they have to learn a different language? Why do you place such a huge burden on them? There are more than enough local programmes here for them.”

Read more: Unhealthy growth of medical schools http://www.nst.com.my/nst/articles/2educ/Article/#ixzz1FuLP1aTT

 This was something that was published in NST yesterday. Again, the same issue that was raised in The Star few weeks ago. Again I would like to suggest that there must be a strict entrance qualification into medical schools with only certain Pre-U courses being recognised. This must be monitored by the medical council. The government must scrap all these foundation courses that are being conducted by various colleges as an easier route to do medicine with no standardization. Soon, even students who fail SPM may be able to do medicine! God save this country!

Mediocre students becoming doctors

EVERYONE knew she was a mediocre student, yet Lina (not her real name) was bent on pursuing a career in medicine.

Armed with her not so spectacular Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia results of weak credits in Biology, Chemistry, and a pass in Physics and Additional Maths, she applied to do medicine in several of the local public and private universities.

Her applications were rejected. But Lina was determined to be a doctor.
On her insistence, her family enrolled her at a local medical college which offered preparatory courses to do medicine in several South Asian and East Asian countries.

Despite acknowledging that her results were not up to the mark, the college took her in as a student and made her re-sit her SPM science subjects.

Within seven months, she completed her pre-medical course and Lina is now pursuing her first year of medical studies in a relatively unknown university in Bangladesh.
Stories like Lina’s are not isolated. The pathway to that “elusive” medical degree seems to be getting easier, even for those who don’t meet the standards.

Over the last 10 years, Malaysia has seen a mushrooming of private medical colleges to meet the increasing number of high-achieving school leavers who fail to secure the limited medical seats available in our public universities.

At last count, there were 26 public and private universities and colleges offering medical degrees.
While the majority of these universities and colleges impose strict entry requirements, including having distinctions or strong credits in Science subjects at A-Levels, some are a little more accommodating in their pre-entry qualifications.

Many of the smaller colleges offer foundation courses in medicine for those who do not have the minimum entry requirement of strong credits in Science subjects and Mathematics. Students from these colleges go on to pursue a medical degree in lesser known foreign universities, usually in Asia and eastern Europe.

What worries the medical fraternity, and Malaysians in general, is the quality of doctors the less established medical colleges are churning out.

As Malaysian Medical Association (MMA) president Dr David Quek pointed out in the December issue of the MMA Bulletin “it’s not just the medical degree from ‘any’ university, but the prestige and the quality of the medical university or college that truly matters”.

The MMA has reason to be concerned as recent reports have indicated that many housemen, including those from local universities and colleges, are so inept that they cannot perform even simple procedures that medical aides, such as nurses, can do.

Dr Quek stresses that the government’s goal of trying to achieve a doctor-patient ratio of 1:400 by 2020 is “way too fast and too soon”, cautioning that it won’t be long before the country faces not just a glut of doctors “but also a possible erosion of standards”, due to the insufficient infrastructure and training and supervising personnel to cater to the influx of medical graduates.

A doctor who has been practising for more than 20 years concurs that standards have dropped quite drastically.

“Now, some of these housemen do not even know how to insert an intravenous drip or take a patient’s blood pressure or take a proper case history… and these are basics every medical student needs to know.”

He adds that when pre-entry requirement standards are lowered, then the industry would eventually churn out sub-standard doctors.

He says even when he was studying in India in the 80’s, he knew of students who did not make the grade but were offered seats in some lesser known medical colleges after paying huge capitation fees.

“Some of these students who entered the university a few years before me, had still not completed their studies when I graduated. Some took up to 10 years to complete their medical degree which most of us did within seven years. One wonders how competent a doctor they would be.”

He says because of the large number of medical graduates and limited number of teaching hospitals, many were not gaining enough experience during their housemanship.

“As housemen, we used to work 15 to 20 hours daily and if we were on call, it could even be 36 hours. But I am all the better for it as I was able to serve in various hospitals in Kuala Lumpur, Sabah and Terengganu and gained wide clinical experience as we were expected to do everything,” he adds.

Read more: Mediocre students becoming doctors http://www.nst.com.my/nst/articles/20spmd/Article/#ixzz1EafA1CBh

//

PETALING JAYA: Students who want to take up medicine should assess their own capabilities and choose universities with good international ranking, said Malaysian Medical Association president Dr David Quek.

“They should choose a school with good international ranking and not because it is cheap and easy to enter and pass,” he said.

Dr Quek said this in response to news reports yesterday that quoted Higher Edu­cation Minister Datuk Seri Khaled Nordin as saying that medical courses offered by recognised foreign universities would be checked to eliminate doubts about their standard.

He said it was difficult for the Government to monitor all schools overseas.

He said that while many Malaysian parents wanted their children to study medicine, it was not just for anyone as the job was stressful.

He said seven doctors had mental breakdown each month and the highest number in recent months was 20.

While parents might think their children who scored seven or eight As in Form 5 were intelligent, Dr Quek said Form 5 and matriculation results were not the best indicators.

“They should go through A-Level studies or sit for the STPM and obtain at least 2As in science subjects. This will indicate if they can grasp things fast and are mature enough in their thinking,” he said.

He also said that if top Form 5 Science students decided to do a foundation course, the course duration should be one to one-and-a-half years and that their acceptance should not be automatic but subject to satisfactory standards.

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

Will Perdana University, Newcastle, Monash and the rest end up  similar ? Our government is always good at coming up with grandiose projects but one thing they don’t realise is the fact that we DO NOT have enough human resource capabilities/brains to make these projects a success! Whatever said, I don’t think these grandiose projects like Perdana University in collaboration with John Hopkins etc is going to be successful. The government feels that this will bring some of our experts from overseas back to our country but I don’t think so. Already most of the medical schools in the country is struggling to get enough academics, how do you aspect all these universities/medical schools to get academics? Newcastle university and Monash University is struggling to find teachers and researchers. The latest I heard is that Monash University which suppose to build the first private teaching hospital(500 bedded) have decided to withhold the plan. Tan Sri Jeffrey Cheah felt that it is not an economically viable investment !

 

No doubt that the 600 bedded private hospital by Perdana University may be able to attract more consultants to work with them but is it economically viable?. Would our private patients allow students to touch and treat them? The health system in this country is totally different with any of the western country. John Hopkins or even RCSI is not pouring in any money into this Perdana University project and they can pull out at any time. They will only know the problems once they start to recruit staffs! When I first met Newcastle CEO ( a british guy) last year, what I realised was that he got no clue whatsoever about the situation in the ground. I came out of his room and told to myself that within the next few months, the same guy is going to come to us looking for part-time lecturers (which he said earlier that he is not interested). Fair enough, by December 2010, they were desperately looking for part-time consultants and even willing to offer higher than what Monash was offering for fractional staff. And just 2 weeks ago, he visited my hospital wanting to sign an MOU to allow our consultants to teach part time!!

 

In fact, said its chief executive Leong Choon Heng, the university is now down to “less than RM10 million” and is forced to take aggressive cost-cutting measures to keep afloat.

He was responding to queries after Malaysiakini received a tip-off on the situation.

Founded in 2001 by senator and former cabinet minister Effendi Norwawi, the Malaysian University of Science and Technology (MUST) was supposed to be a premier postgraduate university in partnership with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

The university had received the money in instalments between January 2001 and 2006, via the MUST Ehsan Foundation. Effendi has been a trustee of the foundation since 2001.

But 10 years on, the university is far from even meeting its 2007 target of 500 students, with only 207 enrolled.

Furthermore, most of these students are undergraduates who were enrolled to boost the numbers after an all-time low of 10 students in 2007.

During the tenure of former chief executive Omar Abdul Rahman, who resigned in March and was once advisor of science and technology to then premier Dr Mahathir Mohamad, the university did not acquire much physical assets.

The university has always been located in office lots in Kelana Square, as initial plans to build a campus through MUST Ehsan Development was shelved.

MUST Ehsan Development – a subsidiary of the public-listed Encorp Group founded by Effendi – was supposed to develop the land surrounding the designated site of the campus in Shah Alam.

The revenue from this was to be used to fund the construction of the campus and other university activities.

MUST Ehsan Development has a portfolio of projects worth RM800 million, including the mixed-development project dubbed the Strand in Kota Damansara. However, it has nothing to do with the Foundation or MUST.

Malaysiakini contacted Effendi about two weeks ago as a key representative of the previous management, but he has yet to respond to the issues raised.

Where the money went

Leong, who took over management about three months ago, said most of the grant was spent to finance the students and to recruit faculty members from leading universities abroad.

“From 2002-2006, a sizeable amount of the grant was spent on scholarships and stipend for the pioneer batch of students. The majority needed more than three semesters to graduate, as the MIT curriculum was very demanding,” he said.

To date 107 students have graduated under the MUST-MIT programme, which expired in 2004.

This number, said Leong who is also a faculty member, is “a normal figure for post-graduate programmes, as with public universities of similar size over a similar time period”.

The university has lab equipment, books and office equipment and three Proton Perdana cars – all of which once cost millions of ringgit but have now depreciated severely in value.

Malaysiakini understands that MUST has been paying rental for about 30 rooms, which it had never used since opening its doors. It is understood that millions of ringgit have been spent on renovations to the premises.

To cut costs and revive the university, the new management team is letting go of several of the four floors it has been renting.

“We’ve let go of floors and rooms which we have never used and are in the midst of gradually moving to the Strand, which we feel will give us a better profile as there are other colleges located there,” said Leong.

Letting go of these rooms is expected to return some RM60,000 to the university’s bank account.

The management will channel this to “aggressive marketing”, in the hope of attracting more students.

Leong added that the rental for the new premises, owned by MUST Ehsan Development, is expected to be “the same or better” than the sum currently being paid.

For now at least, the Higher Education Ministry is giving MUST another chance to turn things around, even though the university does not meet the minimum of RM20 million paid-up capital that is required of private universities.

“MUST is undergoing a rebranding exercise under new management (and) is now also offering undergraduate degree and diploma courses,” explained Mohd Najib Masrom, the ministry’s senior assistant director of the private higher education management sector, by email.

The licence for MUST to run its foundation programme is pending renewal.

The university licence will expire in 2012. It is understood that such permits are worth several million ringgit.

PETALING JAYA: There is growing concern about the quality of doctors that the country is churning out.