PETALING JAYA: The 4,263 permanent positions being offered to medical officers and efforts to address overcrowding at public healthcare facilities are steps in the right direction, say stakeholders.
In her New Year message, Health Minister Dr Zaliha Mustafa said permanent positions in the government’s healthcare service will be given to 335 dental officers and 316 pharmacy officers.
Malaysian Medical Association (MMA) president Dr Muruga Raj Rajathurai said he is pleased that Zaliha has been receptive to the ideas proposed by the association and anticipates more engagements with her and the Health Ministry in the future.
He said the move to extend operation hours at public clinics is a good temporary solution to mitigate overcrowding, especially at night, adding that there must be sufficient manpower to ensure its successful implementation.
“There must be enough medical officers, specialists, medical assistants, healthcare personnel, administrative staff and reasonable shift schedules for it to be carried out seamlessly and efficiently.
“The extended hours should only cater to managing acute illnesses, as the additional hours may also mean staff will have to work longer hours, and this may run counter to the ministry’s efforts to address burnout among healthcare workers,” he told theSun.
On work-life balance, he said it is important to manage this to plug the brain drain and maintain high standards of care at public healthcare facilities.
Muruga said the association is concerned about the long hours healthcare workers are putting in, adding that overworked staff and burnout can have an impact on the level of care at public
medical facilities.
“MMA found that issues related to overworking and burnout were due to shortages in manpower and poor distribution of doctors nationwide, which have resulted in many of them having to work beyond their working hours to handle high patient load.
“Housemen, medical officers and even specialists are working beyond their regular shifts, but they are not being fairly remunerated for the extra hours and services they provide.
“Like everyone else, they too have a family and financial commitments. They also need a work-life balance but it has been non-existent for most of them.”
He revealed that MMA is planning to meet the Public Services Department (PSD) and the Human Resources Ministry to get their views on the matter and find solutions to the issues.
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the Hartal Doktor Kontrak (HDK) movement said although it welcomes Putrajaya’s decision to provide permanent posts in public healthcare, it seeks transparency on the vacant posts.
“While we accept the move as swift and efficient, we wonder where the vacancies came from. Previously, the PSD and Health Ministry pointed fingers at each other on the difficulty of employing more healthcare workers. We are puzzled how PSD is offering almost 5,000 permanent posts on short notice.
“These posts could have been announced earlier to avoid doctors from leaving the country for better opportunities abroad, especially those who did not get positions on the first attempt. Nevertheless, we are looking forward to those permanent posts and wish the best to those applying.”