Comments on: Concern over Russian and Ukraine Med Schools III

By: supergoh

supergoh — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 00:58:42 +0000

I wonder how some incompetent doctors here can compete with foreign doctors when ASEAN Free Trade Area is opened up by the end of the year.The government seems not to care about whether they will be squeezed out or not .The government just wants to minimize healthcare costs.Of course,the majority of Malaysian population will benefit the most from the government move.This move is long overdue.

By: gyk

gyk — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 07:39:04 +0000

in Malaysia, as always, everything “boleh”
like it or not, some medical students “graduate” even without knowing basic medical knowledge. These “doctors” are already on the loose in the MOH hospitals. Like it or not, in a few years, Malaysia would be flooded with these doctors. is MMC doing their job in making sure all the “new medical schools” only passes those truly qualified? Many of these new colleges has “high” passing rate for their final year students, sometimes up to 90% passes. It is scary when you think that your doctor might be someone who doesn’t even know what a full blood count means

By: lazyman

lazyman — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 09:35:02 +0000

poor doctor
1.FYI even in the early 70′s when i was a medical student in one of the colleges in london,they would reserve 2-3 places for ART stream students who wishes to pursue a career in med.these art students are to take a foundation course in science for a year be4 admission
2.the degree from west indies is a coveted one-graduates are allowed to practise in UK and most commonwealth countries until the introduction of common exams etc.it was still recognised in UK after GMC withrew recognition for our local medical school ie MU in the early 80′s

By: doktoraibolit

doktoraibolit — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 06:34:12 +0000

Hey there!

I have heard news that the Malaysian government is sending 2x the amount of students, as compared to previous years to study medicine in Russian medical schools!

I also heard that those ‘extra’ students were rejected from entering medical schools in other countries, but since the government has made them(students) an offer to study medicine, they have to send them somewhere.
Something FISHY is going on.

If Russian medical schools are so bad, why make life difficult for everybody by sending so many to RUssia?
why waste taxpayers money by sending these students overseas?
If these students are deemed “fit to study medicine” by the interviewers at PSD, why not try to integrate these students into local Unis?
Not possible? then how some it is possible to send to russia?
Unscrupulous agents? Politics? MMC?
So many questions need to be raised n addressed.

P/S:Best of all, the government sponsored students are given a chance to repeat a year in medical school..and this allocation is being abused by some students to squeeze more $ out of the government who is providing them with outrageous amounts of pocket $. On another hand, these students may be the “blacksheep” further wasting taxpayers money. MALAYSIA BOLEH!

By: poor doctor

poor doctor — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 04:50:57 +0000

some of the excuses given in the comments in POTS website:
1. The local graduates are as bad as well: well some of them may have bad quality but my experience told me that almost all the russian graduates lack any clinical experience. One of the russian graduate even told me that there is no clinical experience in their O&G posting.
2. The senior doctors or specialist should bear the resposibility to teach them. The problem is house officer should have some core medical knowledge. Housemanship is the period they apply thier knowledge and gain clinical experience NOT for us to treach them again what they should have learned in medical school

Some examples that I encountered in my hospital:
One of the HO when asked what is the blood test for checking thryroid functions, his answer was FULL BLOOD COUNT (seriously, how to teach this HO medicine in mere 4 months)
One HO set the IV line on the upper limb at the opposite direction of the vein blood flow, away from heart.
They do not know how to calculate EDD, period of gestation.
They do not know even how to do a proper basic obstetric examination.
One of them don’t even know what placenta praevia mean as though this is an alien term for him. etc etc etc

Though I can’t say ALL the russian graduates are bad but so far based on my experience in past 2 years, they are really bad in quality.
How can you trust them when you give them the liscense to kill when they are asked to work alone. But sometime, we have no choice, you can’t expect us to teach them again what they should have learned in 5 years medical school within 2 years of housemanship. There are so many of them. So we are forced to pass them as long as they have good work attitude.

Local graduates may have bad quality HOs as well, but they seldom be as bad as those russian where they can at least present their case in simple english, draw some blood, set IV line, do simple clerking, count EDD etc. Even the medical students attached to my hospitals are better than them.

When asked how they can get into medical school, ome of them got SPM or STPM results which no other local schools will accept not even in other courses. For those who got really bad results, they got into the so called PRE MEDICAL COURSES and miraculously they manage to meet the requirement in 1 year to be enrolled in medical school. Some of them even art stream students. So in Malaysia, semua boleh, you can’t go to UK/US on scholarship, you go to local schools. You can’t go to local schools, don’t worry, there are ample choices of medical schools in Indonesia, Russia, India, Pakistan or even West indies. Don’t forget those schoos like in Romania or other unrecognised schools which are not reacognised by MMC but claimd recgnised by EU. I think in the coming years when the demand continue to grow, we will have medical graduates from Zimbabwe, Kenya, Nigeria or other African countries. How about franchising the South American medical schools as well?

By: DocIncognito

DocIncognito — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 01:22:44 +0000

Of course…it’s not just Russian medical schools that need a review. Some of the local med schools, especially the newer ones might benefit too.

By: DocIncognito

DocIncognito — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 01:17:54 +0000

Nice post Palmdoc. This further underscores the need to critically review medical schools before granting them accreditation. Perhaps the MOH should suspend further enrolment into Russian medical schools and study the matter further. There has been an explosion in the number of housemen in government hospitals lately without a proportional increase in the number of senior registrars and specialists. Flooding the market with incompetent houseman(either local or foreign-trained) will undoubtedly compromise healthcare standards in government hospitals. There’s a well-known maxim for this : Too many cooks spoil the soup.