Hurdles for foreign-trained doctors in Hong Kong reveal double standards

The Medical Council in Hong Kong requires foreign medical graduates to take a licensing exam and complete a period of "retraining" in order to practise here. Experienced physicians supposedly could be exempted from this, but very few are.

There are Hong Kong-born doctors languishing in foreign hospital departments and clinics, preparing and waiting to take this absurd exam. One UK-trained surgeon who passed after five attempts and completed his required internship laments that it took him almost as long as completing a PhD to overcome this hurdle.

Another recent licentiate, having successfully endured this "retraining", presented his sub-specialty credentials from a world-renowned hospital and a large fee for consideration as a specialist, only to be rejected.

Many other specialists and consultants have failed this examination.

Further, requiring experienced foreign-qualified doctors to redo an entire year of an internship that entails being on call for up to 36 hours straight is a waste of precious resources, especially at a time when there is a significant need for doctors in Hong Kong.

A medical intern is typically a fresh graduate who is learning how to manage hospital patients, drawing blood for testing and inserting IV lines in patients. Requiring a neurosurgeon, say, to rotate through this internship in various specialty departments performing these duties at odd hours of the night is ridiculous. His or her skills can be put to much better use.

Experienced and credentialed foreign doctors should be offered an accelerated externship or internship, for three to six months, perhaps no more than six weeks of "training" in the specialties currently part of the internship, so they can adapt and learn the local medical culture and how local services operate.