Dr Hilmi: Govt to produce more family medicine specialists
GEORGE TOWN: The Health Ministry plans to produce more family medicine specialists to be placed in health clinics under National Transformation 2050 ( TN50), said Deputy Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Hilmi Yahaya.
He said there were now only 300 of these specialists and it was difficult for the ministry to place them in health clinics.
“We want to make the health service more individualistic. We want the medical service of the future to have specialists and doctors to know their patients, their diseases. This is our longterm plan to focus on primary care,” he said.
Dr Hilmi spoke to reporters after handing over school bags to 80 pupils of Sekolah Kebangsaan Teluk Bahang near here yesterday. Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak on Thursday night launched TN50 and engaged in a dialogue with 500 people across youth communities in the country to obtain their input on the needs of Malaysians in the future.
Dr Hilmi said the ministry encouraged doctors to take up family medicine at local and foreign universities.
“Not many secured places to take up such training. We have raised the number of places for medical training to 1,000. Previously, we only had 500 to 800 places for training in the country. The problem now is that less than 400 doctors do their Master’s every year. About 150 resign. As such, we will continue to train doctors to be specialists to meet the current need,” he said.
Dr Hilmi said the ministry would seek alternative measures to enable medical specialists to remain in government service. — Bernama