IMPROVING HOUSEMAN TRAINING POLICY CAMPAIGN
4 January 2021 - 7 January 2021
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Policy Document
Recent years, there have been countless emerging cases or news articles featuring issues within Malaysia's Houseman Training, amongst which include prolonged waiting periods for houseman postings, incessant complaints of stresses and fatigue mentally, emotionally, and physically while within the program, and cases of housemanship extensions and dropouts due to incompetency.
Despite commonly discussed, these issues may remain as clear as dishwater to many of us. Thence, as a representative body comprising medical students and junior doctors across seven countries, we aim to raise awareness and affect changes at the level of policymaking, calling upon relevant and important stakeholders, addressing this ever-pressing issue in our healthcare system.
Our policy document has been meticulously crafted as our first steps to affecting big leaps and ripples in our effort to connect, educate, and cultivate leaders who would rise to challenge the current system and shape this new decade of ours.
Workplace bullying amongst housemen has always been whispers and stories narrated from one to another. The recent influx of publicly announced cases and reports of workplace bullying amongst housemen has piqued the attention of many. Surveys have been done to verify the truth behind this pressing issue, which can directly translate into negative effects not only on our junior doctors, but also the patients that we are caring for. This unfortunate consequence has been manifesting with news articles recounting stories of compromised patient care from medical officers.
With these issues, it is eminent for us to reexamine the current Housemanship Training Programme in Malaysia, which has a direct impact on our healthcare system. Let’s work together to strive for a better training environment for housemen in Malaysia!
Reference:
Statistics has shown……
Medical education in Malaysia has witnessed many progressive changes, alongside the sprouting of medical schools in the country. The ratio of the number of medical schools to the population in Malaysia (1:0.93 million) is significantly higher than that of the United States (1:1.72 million) and the United Kingdom (1:1.94 million). As a result, from 2000, the country is seeing a 500% increase in the number of medical graduates, with 5,146 fresh medical graduates at the end of 2015. This number is only expected to rise following the trend. Simultaneously, this drastic increase has posed major challenges to the availability and quality of medical training as a junior doctor.
This is inevitably a difficult issue to tackle. However, we can start by understanding the history and events leading us to where we are, which will aid greatly in allowing us to propose solutions to resolve and better medical training for our junior doctors, particularly, houseman training.
What’s wrong with the system?
Press Statement
