The Malaysian Medical Association (MMA) has called on the Health Ministry to look into its maldistribution of doctors in the public healthcare system.
Its president Dr Koh Kar Chai said in a statement that the ministry and the Department of Statistics should look into the actual trend of general and subspecialty cases in each state and plan accordingly.
“The issue of medical officers quitting is serious and must also be looked into as well because we are haemorrhaging human capital, which is desperately needed.
“While caring for the rakyat, doctors too need adequate rest. If they are on call every other day, it will result in burnout,” he said.
Koh added that state health departments must plan around the allocations of junior medical officers.
“The workforce must not be centred on these temporary workers but instead planned with permanent allocations to the hospitals and departments,” he said.
This comes after Kuala Lumpur Hospital (HKL) reportedly expects to have a shortage of medical officers in the coming weeks due to the exit of junior doctors starting from July 18.
The group Hartal Doktor Kontrak (HDK) tweeted an internal letter, dated June 30, signed by the hospital’s deputy director (medical) Dr Marina Abdullah Sani mentioning the shortage of doctors.
Following this, she said a meeting will be held at the hospital’s auditorium yesterday afternoon with all medical staff in administrative roles to discuss a solution.
The Health Ministry, however, denied there was a shortage of doctors and said the meeting called was to coordinate a transfer exercise.
According to health news portal CodeBlue, 768 contract doctors reportedly left their jobs in the Health Ministry last year.
The number of contract medical officers who resigned from government service in 2017 was 110, followed by 168 in 2018, 475 in 2019 and 511 in 2020.
In March, the Health Ministry announced that it has created at least 11,296 permanent positions from 2022 until 2025. This will apply to medical, dental and pharmacy officers. - Mkini
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