Health Ministry to add more vacancies in govt hospitals
BALIK PULAU: The health ministry is planning to add more vacancies for medical officers and specialist doctors to accommodate medical graduates to undergo housemanship at government hospitals.
Health Deputy Minister Datuk Seri Dr Hilmi Yahaya said currently, there were many medical graduates who could not secure placement for housemanship due to insufficient vacancies.
He said the creation of more posts at government hospitals was in line with the 11th Malaysia Plan to have a 1:400 doctor to population ratio by 2020, with the healthcare system improved through various strategies.
“We are currently discussing with the Public Service Department (JPA) to add more vacancies in government hospitals, and the result of the meeting will be made public once everything is finalised,” he told reporters here yesterday.
He said currently, the doctor to population ratio in Malaysia stood at 1:600 and the government needed to create more positions for doctors to achieve the targeted ratio of 1:400.
Hilmi noted that annually, there were about 4,000 to 5,000 medical graduates applying for housemanship and there was insufficient place for them due to the two-year housemanship.
“The problem is that not every medical graduate can pass the housemanship in two years as some may need to extend if they fail certain criteria. So, annually, there are 10,000 medical graduates doing housemanship at government hospitals.”
Earlier, Hilmi, who is also Balik Pulau MP, visited the four children of the late Hanizar Abd Hamid and Zaiton Awang who were killed in a road accident in Sungai Petani last Wednesday.
He said the Balik Pulau Umno would raise funds beginning with RM5,000 to support the children, Ainatul Balqis, 15, Nur Ainul Huda, 13, Muhd Amirul Hafiz, 10 and Iskandar Zulkarnain, eight, who are currently under the care of their aunt, Zurita Mohd Zahir, 40, in Teluk Kumbar.
The couple was killed when the motorcycle they were travelling on, collided with a car before crashing into a parked trailer at the south-bound 106.5km North-South Highway here early Wednesday morning. — Bernama