The newly qualified doctors being inducted.
A TOTAL of one hundred and thirty–eight newly qualified doctors have been inducted into the medical profession by the Medical and Dental Council (MDC).
The new doctors were drawn from the Accra College of Medicine; University of Cape Coast; School of Medical Sciences, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology; School of Medicine and Dentistry, Kumasi; University of Ghana Medical School, Accra; University of Health and Allied Sciences; School of Medical Sciences, Ho; and some foreign trained doctors who passed the council’s registration examination.
At a short induction ceremony in Accra, Professor Kwame Nyame, Chairman of the Medical and Dental Council, in a speech read on his behalf, said the newly qualified doctors and dentists will be transitioned to patients care, but work under supervision for two years for their housemanship.
He said due to the increasing numbers of doctors and dentists being trained, the council has had to accredit and expand the numbers of hospitals for housemanship training.
“The attention of the Council has been drawn to the fact that many of the doctors do the house job on part time basis. Some of you apply for full time academic programmes and spend the house job time attending lectures at the various universities. Council will work with your institutions to ensure closer supervision of the house job. Practitioners who fail into this category will face the full rigours of the law when found out,” he warned.
Prof. Nyame urged the newly inducted doctors to focus on the house job and do it well.
“In line with the increase in the use of technology worldwide and the digitisation of many processes, you will find yourself working in institutions that have gone paperless and are using electronic medical records.
“This creates an opportunity for you to improve your typing skills and computer literacy in general, so that entry of patients’ data does not become a barrier to health,” he said.
The chairman of the MDC reminded the newly inducted doctors to treat records of patients with the confidentiality that it requires.
Minister of Health, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, said the induction of the new doctors will augment the current strength of about 10,000 doctors and dentists serving in various parts of the country.
He touched on the negative attitudes and conduct of some health care professionals and said, “In accordance with the ministry’s focus on issues of professional and institutional accountability, the Medical and Dental Council will outdoor a number of policy guidelines developed that include practitioners stamp name tag and appropriate professional apparel policy to enforce professional standards and promote easy identification of the various categories of practitioners working within the healthcare space.
“Also, there will be the specialist register to ensure that practitioners do not indulge in practices completely outside their areas of competence or pass themselves off as possessing expertise they do not have, leaving patients insufficiently protected,” he added.
BY Linda Tenyah-Ayettey