Hong Kong’s scheme for foreign-trained doctors gets dozens of applications but only 5 considered qualified, Hospital Authority says
- Applicants among nearly 100 inquiries authority received since scheme was launched last year to allow overseas-trained doctors to practise in Hong Kong
- Hospital Authority has begun dialogue with five applicants deemed qualified for scheme, but says it will take time before first batch of doctors can come to city
A controversial registration scheme for non-locally trained doctors has received almost 40 applications so far, but only five of the candidates are considered qualified, according to Hong Kong’s Hospital Authority.
The applicants were among about 100 inquiries the authority had received since the “special registration” scheme was launched after the government amended the Medical Registration Ordinance last October, exempting graduates of non-local medical schools from passing a local licensing exam before practising in Hong Kong.
Fifty medical institutes are currently accredited. Shanghai’s Fudan University is the only listed mainland Chinese school.
A government-appointed committee would add more institutions to the list of recognised medical qualifications as per the established procedure, Dr Tang Kam-shing, a chief manager at the Hospital Authority, said on Monday.
“The list has not been finalised yet,” he told a press briefing. “There isn’t a fixed target as to how many doctors we want to recruit from overseas. The priority is still locally trained doctors.”
Under the scheme, overseas-trained doctors will be eligible for full registration in the city without the need for a licensing exam if they fulfil several criteria.
They must be graduates with recognised medical qualifications from the list, already possess medical registration in the place where they graduated, have worked full-time in Hong Kong’s public sector for at least five years after obtaining a specialist qualification, and are considered to have served “satisfactorily and competently” during the five-year period.
Hong Kong permanent residents who are fresh graduates from the recognised medical programmes but have yet to undergo internship in the countries where they trained, will also be eligible to take the licensing exam and undergo internship in the city.
Previously, non-locally trained doctors could only take the licensing exam if they had already received an internship elsewhere.
Successful applicants will be required to work at a public hospital for five to 10 years, depending on their seniority.
Following the law’s passage, the Hospital Authority began advertising the new pathway, including setting up virtual booths at academies and societies. Authorities also placed advertisements in medical journals.
According to Tang, roughly 100 doctors had inquired about the programme, of which almost 40 had applied.
The Hospital Authority had entered into dialogue with five applicants it deemed qualified for the scheme, Tang said, adding that none came from Fudan.
Those doctors would replenish the workforce in the face of a “fretting” exit wave of medical practitioners across the city’s 42 public hospitals, he said.
The attrition rate over the past year constituted a record 8 per cent of the workforce of some 6,000 doctors, he added, with practitioners from certain specialties, such as anaesthesiology, seeing an 11 per cent decline.
But it would take at least six months before the first batch of doctors could come to Hong Kong, Tang noted.
Last year, 4.9 per cent of public hospital doctors resigned from their jobs, up from 4.1 per cent in 2020.
Critics have warned the new regime would undermine the city’s healthcare services, and that mainland doctors would face a language barrier in Hong Kong hospitals.
But former health minister Sophia Chan Siu-chee last year dismissed concerns that the new route would lead to lower standards.
Special registration is among two channels for foreign-trained doctors to register in Hong Kong, the other being limited registration, under which doctors have to renew their certification every three years.
Dr Frankie Ng Fung-kei, an associate consultant of anaesthesiology at Tuen Mun Hospital, returned to Hong Kong via the limited registration programme last September after working in Britain for 14 years.
“It is beyond my expectations. I specialise in obstetric anaesthesiology. I get to help train specialty doctors in Hong Kong,” said Ng, who is in his 40s.
“It was a game changer. Because of the Covid-19 pandemic, I couldn’t take leave in the UK. This job has enabled me to look after my parents in Hong Kong.”
