KUALA LUMPUR: The Health Ministry has dismissed a suggestion to make it mandatory for female patients to be treated by female medical officers and female gynaecologists only.
Its deputy minister Datuk Rosnah Shirlin said there were just not enough female gynaecologists to make the proposal feasible.
"However we have rules in place that if a female patient is examined by a male gynaecologist, a female medical officer must act as a chaperone for the patient," she said in parliament in response to Mohd Nasir Zakaria (PAS-Padang Terap).
She added that the ministry's priorities in placement of doctors was based on workload and not gender.
According to the statistics in 2011, 1.05 million patients sought the services of gynaecologists and the current national ratio of gynaecologists to patients was 1:4,695.
Rosnah revealed that up to Sept 10 this year, there were a total of 245 gynaecologists, of which 109 were males and 136 females.
In a bid to increase the number of specialists in the country, the ministry has increased Masters studies slots in public higher learning institutes from 450 to 600 in the 2010/2011 academic session intake and to 800 in the 2011/2012 intake.
The ministry also offers 150 scholarships every year for students to pursue sub-specialty studies.
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