(Penang, Sunday):
University
Malaya Vice Chancellor Prof. Datuk Dr. Anuar Zaini Mohd Zain yesterday sounded
the alarm over the decline in teaching standards in public and private medical
schools, warning that a lack of
qualified academic staff was affecting medical education and the quality of
doctors produced.
This
is a problem which had afflicted
the country for close to three decades, worsening with
every passing year since the United
Kingdom General Medical Council (GMC) withdrew its recognition for the MBBS of
the University of Malaya from 1985 after the failure of the university
authorities to remedy major deficiencies in its medical school programme
although it was given seven years to do so.
Although
there are now seven government medical colleges – in Universiti Malaya,
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Universiti Putra
Malaysia, International Islamic University, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak and
Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Malaysia has not been able to establish itself as a
centre of medical education of excellence with internationally-acknowledged
first-rate medical schools.
Parliament
should take the cue from the alarm sounded by Anuar yesterday and transform the
current parliamentary debate on the 2003 Budget into a major post-mortem on the
quality both of medical education and healthcare in Malaysia..
Anuar
said the ratio of medical lecturers to students in the seven public medical
colleges was currently 1:16, adding that it should be ideally 1:5, which was the
ratio in Singapore.
What
is the ratio of medical lecturers to students in the five private medical
colleges, namely the International Medical University, Melaka-Manipal Medical
College, Penang Medical College, Perak Medical College and Asian Institute of
Medicine, Science and Technology (AIMST) in Sungei Patani, Kedah?
Furthermore,
what is the quality of the medical lecturers in the public and private medical
colleges?
Annuar
said many colleges are importing
foreign medical academic staff,usually from Bangladesh, India and Myanmar, with
at least one college depending solely on this group of lecturers.
Malaysia
is facing a crisis of quality medical education
because of the twin problems of :
Failure
to maintain the tradition of excellence in public medical schools, whether in
academic leadership or recruitment of students; and
the
sprouting of private medical schools to meet the great need for medical
education without proper and effective mechanism to ensure quality training and
graduates.
It
has been a matter of grave concern to thinking Malaysians that one private
medical college proposes to increase its annual intake
to 600 to 700 students, which will be equivalent to the combined intake of all
public medical schools in the
country.
Other
matters of grave concern are
that private colleges are allowed to twin with foreign medical schools of
dubious standards, like the North
Sumatra Medical University, or allowed to start a medical degree programme
without any approval from the Education Ministry, like the MIC-backed Asian
Institute of Medicine, Science and Technology (AIMST) in Kedah.
DAP
calls for a 10-year Quality Medical Education Master Plan for Malaysia to become
a world-class medical education, health-care and biomedical hub, which should
review the present medical education system and make recommendations for reforms
for public and private medical education in the country, including:
The
restoration of meritocracy in public universities/medical schools;
Government
should set up at least one public
medical university/school for every
state in the country;
Encouragement
for the establishment of community-based private medical colleges, where quality
of education and community service take clear precedence over the profit-motive.
Role
of private medical colleges to produce quality medical graduates and to
contribute to the provision of
medical services for the people and to carry out research and development
activities particularly in the life sciences.
(29/9/2002)