Materia Medica Malaysiana

How’s your bedside manners, doc?

The bedside manners of doctors is one of the elements that will be considered when assessing their competency.

The Deputy Director-General of Health, Datuk Dr Ismail Merican, said doctors must provide evidence that they had the knowledge and skills to be effective, competent, safe and reliable healthcare providers.

The competency assessment will cover all allied healthcare providers, including doctors.

Dr Ismail said what the Health Ministry hoped to implement with its involvement in the Continuing Professional Development (CPD) of healthcare providers was to link the assessment to what they did in their daily routine. "Doctors should not complain anymore about being assessed for competency based on something irrelevant." He said doctors were unhappy about the competency assessment as they felt that some portions of it were not relevant.

But with the new directive from Health Minister Datuk Dr Chua Soi Lek, he said, the ministry had come up with its own assessment for allied healthcare providers besides that of the Public Services Department (PSD).

"We cannot just promote people with any form of objective assessment. We will start with doctors first. Later, we will rope in the pharmacists, physicists, researchers and other allied health personnel." He said the competency assessment would also be based on credit points and logbook, meaning doctors would be assessed on how they performed in certain procedures and how they related to patients and others.

The ministry, he added, was working closely with the Section Concerning House Officers, Medical Officers and Specialists (SCHOMOS) and Malaysian Medical Association (MMA) to introduce the CPD activity in the assessment so that doctors would be evaluated on competency. "Doctors must provide evidence that they are armed with the necessary knowledge and skills to be effective, competent, safe and reliable healthcare providers." He said doctors were happy with this even though the requirements were quite stringent. "They are happy because they feel they would be evaluated based on something that is more relevant to what they do," he said, adding that they also needed to know some of the government procedures and policies as it was important to their core business.

"Doctors and allied healthcare personnel must be aware of the existing government policies so that they can work within the framework of policy decisions made by the Government." Dr Ismail said there were doctors and allied healthcare providers who did not know what was going on around them, including the policies within which they had to work. "They must know what they can and cannot do." He added that the Government was also introducing leadership and strategic planning skills for senior government officers who needed to be trained in the field.

"CPD is important because it will ensure that people are continuously updated and whatever they do is in keeping with the times so that they don't lose out on skills," he added.

He said that over the years a lot of things had changed and a lot of new skills and knowledge developed.

"There is also the changing global challenges and the expectation of the public is even greater," he said, adding that this was why they wanted doctors and those in healthcare to be equipped with the knowledge and skills which they may not have acquired as graduates.

At present, doctors have to undergo examinations and go for courses organised by the PSD.

Although they will still undergo one examination with the PSD, the ministry would conduct its own competency assessment for its staff. Dr Ismail also stressed that the CPD involved doctors in the public and private sectors as well.

He said it was a systematic process of life-long learning and professional development aimed at enabling healthcare providers to maintain and enhance their knowledge, skills and competence for effective clinical practice to meet the needs of the population.

Dr Ismail added that the CPD dealt with issues that were linked with professional competency, provision of quality care and improved health outcomes for doctors in both the public and private sectors.