our training was basically tougher than those of the pharmacist

Where is the most ideal state for doctors in the NYSC programme?
PH,lagos or Abuja

when did things get to doctors vs pharmacists?

In Nigeria, it used to be doctors vs nurses, with both professions claiming the upper hand.

As for the nurse anaesthetist earning more than some doctors, the truth is that the service they are rendering is seen as more important hence the pay.Its the basic laws of demand and supply.

that story was misleading.

Nurse anaethetists might make more than on average than a family practitioner, but the basis of comparison is wrong.

An anesthesiologist (ie a medical doctor who specialized in anesthesiology), makes double the nursing equivalent's salary.

If the reporter wasnt being mischievious, he or she should have compared the average salary of a general nurse practitioner, with the family doctor's own.

The entire write up was misinformation, imo.

No one has said a word about opportunities in Australia. Are there rooms for consultant anaesthesiologist from naija?

^^ most countries are tightening their visa rules but you can still check with their embassies.

OMOSOFE F:

No one has said a word about opportunities in Australia. Are there rooms for consultant anaesthesiologist from naija?

I am based in the UK and visa rules on training applies to newcomers. You can work as a doctor, but not as a doctor training to be a consultant.
I am aware that you can migrate to Australia and work there provided that you have got the licence to. You will need to go to Australian Medical Council via Google website.
Because you are a consultant, there may be a room for you to practice and avoid some of the exams non consultant doctors need to write and pass. I'm not too sure of that.
If you do get the licence, you are more likely to be posted to rural areas where your services maybe needed most.
You can practice in the UK if you want to, but it won't be as a consultant, but as a senior doctor (middle grade doctor). I'm also aware that if you have got UK medical licence and have worked for at least 6 months, you will be able to get work in Australia and need not write any exam, but that is for non consultant doctors. I don't have much information for overseas consultants.

saokea:

I am based in the UK and visa rules on training applies to newcomers. You can work as a doctor, but not as a doctor training to be a consultant.
I am aware that you can migrate to Australia and work there provided that you have got the licence to. You will need to go to Australian Medical Council via Google website.
Because you are a consultant, there may be a room for you to practice and avoid some of the exams non consultant doctors need to write and pass. I'm not too sure of that.
If you do get the licence, you are more likely to be posted to rural areas where your services maybe needed most.
You can practice in the UK if you want to, but it won't be as a consultant, but as a senior doctor (middle grade doctor). I'm also aware that if you have got UK medical licence and have worked for at least 6 months, you will be able to get work in Australia and need not write any exam, but that is for non consultant doctors. I don't have much information for overseas consultants.

i feel you my brother,since you can smile at your pay sleep at the end of the month why bother yourself coming here.But what do you mean by one being able to work as a practitioner and not as a resident in the UK,can you please clarify.

Where is every body.hapi holidays.@guysparrow:it depends on where u know how 2 operate best.but i think there r more chances for privatePr in lagos.

: Medical Doctors' Forum: Let Us Know You!
« #245 on: March 12, 2010, 05:42 PM »
^^^

The average cost of dialysis is £30,000 per patient per year.
http://www.kidney.org.uk/campaigns/Transplantation/ukt-press-dec03.html

Each session will cost about £230
http://www.privatehealth.co.uk/hospitaltreatment/find-a-treatment/dialysis-treatment/bmi-healthcare/

The cost of a kidney transplant would be in the region of £20,000 per patient per transplant.

If you are thinking of accessing these interventions privately, then below are the contact details of people you may wish to contact:

The London Independent Hospital
Renal Dialysis Unit
1 Beaumont Sq
Stepney Green, London, E1 4NL

Tel: 0800 656 9606
Fax: 020 7780 2416
Email: dialysis_lih@bmihealthcare.co.uk
Web site: www.bmihealthcare.co.uk


Good luck

!

@Beneli
Thanks alot for the info. God bless.

Simply go to www.blackcv.com and upload your CV today.They distribute your CV to thousands of employers/recruiters worldwide thus increasing your chances of landing the job of your dreams withing a short period of time.Upload your CV/Resume and let Employers/Recruiters hunt for you.

hi everybody,
i am mbbs and have completed masters in public health from uni of london uk.i m here in uk for the last 4 years searching for a job in public health but am unsuccessful.can anyone please guide me or help me how to find a job in uk?thanks

Doctors why are people dying too much in our hospitals? Is It incompetency,drugs funds, or what ? Its really pathetic

Lol my ques. Hasnt been answd

SLIGHT:

Doctors why are people dying too much in our hospitals? Is It incompetency,drugs funds, or what ? Its really pathetic

I doubt it is incompetence.

On average, one can say that Nigerian Doctors, are NOT 'incompetent. Of course, one may admit that there is a deterioration in the quality of graduates from Nigerian universities in all professions, but even within this decadence, Nigerian Doctors are proving themselves to be resilient, competent and indeed very innovative. The service they deliver in Nigeria may at times seem below standard, but that has more to do with the health regulatory bodies, the quality assurance mechanisms in place, availability and access to modern equipments, and not so much to do with the Doctors themselves. If you go to hospitals in the UK, and in US where standardised service-delivery models and quality assurance mechanisms are in place, you will see a lot of Nigerian trained Doctors, favourably competing with their colleagues from all over the world and delivering very high standards of care.

So, the problem you highlight is with the Nigerian Health system, and not with the Doctors.

beneli:

I doubt it is incompetence.

On average, one can say that Nigerian Doctors, are NOT 'incompetent. Of course, one may admit that there is a deterioration in the quality of graduates from Nigerian universities in all professions, but even within this decadence, Nigerian Doctors are proving themselves to be resilient, competent and indeed very innovative. The service they deliver in Nigeria may at times seem below standard, but that has more to do with the health regulatory bodies, the quality assurance mechanisms in place, availability and access to modern equipments, and not so much to do with the Doctors themselves. If you go to hospitals in the UK, and in US where standardised service-delivery models and quality assurance mechanisms are in place, you will see a lot of Nigerian trained Doctors, favourably competing with their colleagues from all over the world and delivering very high standards of care.

So, the problem you highlight is with the Nigerian Health system, and not with the Doctors.

@beneli,
I would put your response into another context. Doctors, like other professionals in Nigeria, also have proven to be susceptible to the general mentality pervading Nigeria's horizon: the desperation for lucre, and the total lack of any desire for service excellence and innovation. That in itself has led to gross incompetence in the general Nigeria work climate, medicine not excluded.

I'd like to assure you that the majority of Nigerian doctors, just like other professionals, are incompetent. We do have seemingly world-class medical establishments like the St. Nicholas's, Reddingtons and Premiers, all privately-run institutions, that shockingly harbour an unbelievable level of incompetence on the part of the medical staff. These institutions cater to the wealthy, the corporate establishments, and even the diplomatic community, and charge top dollar for their services.

I have spent six hours at Premier Specialists, without being attended to, because the doctors were attending a meeting.. I know many cases of patient abuse at Lagoon hospitals, another so-called first-class institution. I could go on and on with various examples. We can always argue that these things happen everywhere, but some cases you hear in Nigeria are simply absurd.

Of course Nigerian doctors would perform well in developed environments, since those climes do not permit the general attitude that is accepted here. No room for mediocrity elsewhere, but lots of room in Nigeria.

^^^

Bros, I know where you are coming from, but saying that 'Nigerian Doctors' are incompetent, i would argue, is somewhat generalistic: some Nigerian Doctors may be incompetent, perhaps, but certainly not ALL, as the statement (by adrenaline) would imply.

My argument, or at least what I try to argue, is that the problem with the quality of health services has to do with the sytem in place and not so much with 'Nigerian Doctors'. The fact that these same Nigerian Doctors are able to perform exceedingly well when exposed to more organised environments, demonstrates that they (okay, we) are not inherently incompetent. One may be tempted, in self-defence that is, to argue that the 'Nigerian service-users are getting what they deserve' as they are not holding the service-providers (i.e. the doctors, the hospitals, the whole damned system) accountable for the quality of services they recieve. But such an argument would be rather callous and a tad simplistic.

So, my argument remains that there is gross systemic failure.


Edited-

Okay, I re-read your post and notice that you said 'the majority'. But the gist of my post still remains!

^^^

I do share the concern though that there is a big problem. That fact is irrefutable!

@beneli,
I do feel your pain, and have no intentions of generalizing.
But I'll still disagree. As far as I am concerned, I chose to be a competent professional working in Nigeria (an engineer) irrespective of the systemic failures around me. That in itself has its joys and pains, but overall I am satisfied. The majority of individuals in my profession chose to be selectively competent, or basically incompetent, while masking their incompetence with tough talk, and blaming it all on either the system, the economic downturn, sheer luck of the draw, or whatever catches their fancy.

I take the same views with medicine. Not only do I have personal friends who are doctors, I also visit hospitals, and consider the majority to be incompetent, after all said. Might be harsh, but I choose not to blame the system. The NMA is made up of successful doctor-entrepreneurs. Why have they not made positive efforts to reform the system, starting from their various practices and private clinics? Is that also under the control of government?

^^^

Ajanlekoko, you are harsh!

To be honset though, I can't hold fort for the NMA, however I do agree that we, the Doctors, have not given ourselves a lot to be proud of in Nigeria.

One only needs to open a Nigeran newspaper to read of cases of clinical negligence, patient abuse etc. So I would be a bit foolish to try to mount a strong defence for my colleagues. Having said that, there is still systemic failure, which cannot be denied. I am sure that there are a lot of quality assurance mechanisms in place within the industry you work in. Such standardised, evidence based mechanisms are lacking in our health industry. That's the systemic failure, I'm on about.

A colleague who shares the same 'pain' about the state of the health industry, introduced me to this organisation in Nigeria http://sqhn.org/web/ which on paper seems to be set up to remedy some of the issues. In the UK, it''s a body like them that has been instrumental to improving the quality of services by facilitating the introduction of proper standards of health care and regulations. I have recently become a member and will be presenting a paper in their upcoming conference in July. I am sure that members of the public will be welcome to attend where they can vent their frustrations at doctors articulately.

Obviously the solution to our problems transcends presenting 'papers' at conferences. There's need to move beyond the cliched 'rhetoric' to action. And the action should be one that brings about palpable, measurable change. The idea is that when some of the solutions are discussed in circles that have the muscles to be able to do something, which i presume the Society for Quality Healthcare in Nigeria is, then the change we want can happen.

But at the end of the day, a sytem works only as far as those that are within it wants it to work: as you may be aware, my Patient Advocay Service  (http://www.bpshealthcare.com/index.php?edata=MzA2MiNtZW51) is now available in Nigeria to people who wish to access aid to pursure litigation against those percieved to be quacks! So sometimes, the ball can be in the court of the sevice-users. Meaning that the service-users have a role to play as well!

hi people, just wanna say I love this thread and I really feel bad for the sorry state of our healthcare system in Nigeria. I moved out of Nigeria when I was 16, and I had always dreamt of being a doctor. I finished my waec at 14 yrs old and started writing jamb but couldn't get into med school. I secured myself an admission into a private uni to study biochem hoping i would take the graduate entry route but God had other plans. I only spent a semester and I had to move to the u.k with my family. I'm at uni now studying Medical and pharmacological sciences, a 3yr course and I'm going to enter for post-graduate medicine afterwards. When I tell people that I don't think I would even go back to Nigeria to practice pharmacology not to even talk of medicine, it's not arrogance neither is it because I'm resident in the u.k but because I do understand a little bit of how the system works. It is even no use getting all the professional training done here and no way to utilize it in Nigeria because they lack the facilities. As much as I feel the need to help  turn tables around in Nigeria, I have come to realize that change over there is not automatic. Realistically, I can't see it. I feel bad for all the doctors out there. But let me leave you with something, you have the power to change your destiny only if you will key yourself into it. Surround yourself with the right things (information, friends, books) and also God is the Most important factor most of us Rule out of it.You CANNOT rule the GOD FACTOR out of your life because if you do, life will make no sense, or little meaning to you. He says everything is READY for us, it is only left for you to TAP into his promises.

hi everybody.anybody knows about ukranian medical schools.

A qualified lab scientist is needed in an established diagnostic centre in egbeda.he/she must have about 4-5 years experience and must know how to run clinical chemistry tests.pls send ur rsume to ambassadorlanry@yahoo.com

beneli:

^^^

Ajanlekoko, you are harsh!

To be honset though, I can't hold fort for the NMA, however I do agree that we, the Doctors, have not given ourselves a lot to be proud of in Nigeria.

One only needs to open a Nigeran newspaper to read of cases of clinical negligence, patient abuse etc. So I would be a bit foolish to try to mount a strong defence for my colleagues. Having said that, there is still systemic failure, which cannot be denied. I am sure that there are a lot of quality assurance mechanisms in place within the industry you work in. Such standardised, evidence based mechanisms are lacking in our health industry. That's the systemic failure, I'm on about.

A colleague who shares the same 'pain' about the state of the health industry, introduced me to this organisation in Nigeria http://sqhn.org/web/ which on paper seems to be set up to remedy some of the issues. In the UK, it''s a body like them that has been instrumental to improving the quality of services by facilitating the introduction of proper standards of health care and regulations. I have recently become a member and will be presenting a paper in their upcoming conference in July. I am sure that members of the public will be welcome to attend where they can vent their frustrations at doctors articulately.

Obviously the solution to our problems transcends presenting 'papers' at conferences. There's need to move beyond the cliched 'rhetoric' to action. And the action should be one that brings about palpable, measurable change. The idea is that when some of the solutions are discussed in circles that have the muscles to be able to do something, which i presume the Society for Quality Healthcare in Nigeria is, then the change we want can happen.

But at the end of the day, a sytem works only as far as those that are within it wants it to work: as you may be aware, my Patient Advocay Service  (http://www.bpshealthcare.com/index.php?edata=MzA2MiNtZW51) is now available in Nigeria to people who wish to access aid to pursure litigation against those percieved to be quacks! So sometimes, the ball can be in the court of the sevice-users. Meaning that the service-users have a role to play as well!

@beneli,
As noble as your cause obviously is, I am miffed in a way. Why do I have to run around complaining about doctors in Nigeria? Why can't the obvious stakeholders, the NMA, put steps in place to protect the integrity of their various private practices? As far as I'm concerned, they're the progenitors of the so-called 'systemic rot', since it obviously benefits them.

Olikoye Ransome-Kuti was widely acknowledged as the nation's best health minister, but still faced major frustrations in the system. As he himself admitted when he left office, “my only regret as I leave the ministry is that I have not been able to mobilise all health workers behind the medical system. Most health workers are only interested in how to maintain their position in the hospital system.” To me, that statement says it all about Nigerians, doctors in particular.

Two mornings ago, I woke up with a sharp pain in my left heel. Thought about going to hospital, but decided against it, by the time I thought about the fact that the doctors would prolly not diagnose anything anyway, or might even waste my time and money, pass me some random drugs, and generally make things not better.

So I went online, diagnosed my ailment at Diagnose-me.com, and started myself on the home treatment (just ice). Goes to show you how scared we are of Nigerian doctors; we now choose to diagnose our ailments by ourselves!

AjanleKoko:

@beneli,
As noble as your cause obviously is, I am miffed in a way. Why do I have to run around complaining about doctors in Nigeria? Why can't the obvious stakeholders, the NMA, put steps in place to protect the integrity of their various private practices?

If the role of the NMA is the same as that of their counterpart in the UK, then most of the things they’d be doing would be focused on protecting the interest of the Doctors.

That’s right. It’s not so much about protecting the ‘integrity of their various private practices’, it’s about protecting Doctors interest in a dog-eat-dog-world. That’s what professional associations do! It doesn’t really matter what is on paper, the NMA officials are voted in by other Doctors based on what they plan to offer to the Doctors.

That’s not to say that they are oblivious of their Hippocratic (hypocrites) oath to practice medicine ethically. Far from it, its just that the bigger picture determines how they meet the obligations of that oath. The bigger picture is that so-called ‘systemic rot’.

AjanleKoko:

As far as I'm concerned, they're the progenitors of the so-called 'systemic rot', since it obviously benefits them.

I think the rot set in because of so many factors.

Obviously Doctors cannot absolve themselves completely of the blame since they (we) haven’t done really that much to change it other than agitate for increased salaries. But can you really blame the Doctors?

Before I left Naija, I doubt I was earning up to 50k per month. Having the toga of a ‘doctor’ around me, there were a lot of responsibilities that started to be thrust upon me, by society, based on the erroneous belief that I was now making loads of money. So because of the demands and expectations upon my meagre income I found myself deteriorating quite rapidly into penury!

To make ends meet I had to look for locums to do, private patients to treat, thereby working round the clock; I was accommodated at my night job, from where I commuted to my day job. I didn’t have a life. I didn’t have access (as in time) for training. I was frustrated. My frustration must have been palpable in my practice, no doubt but I left the country before I snapped.

I cannot speak for my colleagues who are in Nigeria, no matter how I try to empathise with them. But one thing is clear: a hungry man is an angry man, and a lot of our Doctors in Nigeria are hungry. That is a fact.

AjanleKoko:

Olikoye Ransome-Kuti was widely acknowledged as the nation's best health minister, but still faced major frustrations in the system. As he himself admitted when he left office, “my only regret as I leave the ministry is that I have not been able to mobilise all health workers behind the medical system. Most health workers are only interested in how to maintain their position in the hospital system.” To me, that statement says it all about Nigerians, doctors in particular.

I think that Dr Ransome-Kuti’s statement also says quite a lot about the system itself.

It is difficult to mobilize all the health workers within the structures currently available. Structures need to be mounted that allows health workers to be better regulated. Structures need to be in place that defines the standards of care that we wish to achieve, striving to make these standards comply with internationally accepted best practices, and making these standards available to all the health providers. Structures need to be in place that penalizes health providers that do not meet up with these standards. That’s how a system that wants to work, works. 

Civil society organizations also have a role to play. People should be making demands on their health providers and not adopting the ‘ee-go-better’ attitude. The truth is; ee no go better unless we do something about it!

AjanleKoko:

Two mornings ago, I woke up with a sharp pain in my left heel. Thought about going to hospital, but decided against it, by the time I thought about the fact that the doctors would prolly not diagnose anything anyway, or might even waste my time and money, pass me some random drugs, and generally make things not better.

So I went online, diagnosed my ailment at Diagnose-me.com, and started myself on the home treatment (just ice). Goes to show you how scared we are of Nigerian doctors; we now choose to diagnose our ailments by ourselves!

I don’t know what to say, really. I could go on another rant on how it’s dangerous to get our health advise and prescriptions of the internet blah-blah-blah, but I am sure you know all that, so I wonder if saying ‘sorry’, would suffice.

I am a consultant bred and buttered in this country and I will always say that you cannot remove doctors from the greater society and expect them to think or act different from the greater society. We are nigerians first, then doctors, water always finds it level. I am still laughing cos in another 10 years things may go worse in the health sector. The younger ones are even more ruthless than the older ones. They just cant see what all the hype about medicine is about. Soon all you will have left are those that couldnt check out either to other forms of bizness( drs are now tailors, estate agents and deisel suppliers) or to other countries even to work as senior house officers.
And forget the crap people say about humanitarian rubbish, why dont you fly to the USA and ask Drs there to treat you free, is it not the same hippocratic oath we all took( me sha i took the physicians oath). 90 of Drs had no idea of what they were getting into.Once you were good in sciences you were steered towards medicine or engineering. Very few people dreamt of saving lives.

@ Allycat,

I agree with you that a lot of Doctors, if given a second chance, would not opt for a career in Medicine.

For a lot, especially the junior doctors in Nigeria, it's a waste of life, full of frustration and devoid of any quality!  And as long as the health system continues in its present free fall into total collapse, then as you rightly suggested, the younger ones will continue to be even more ruthless, the patient will suffer even more and the brain drain will get even more intense. But it shouldn't be so.

I keep on harping on about the 'system' being the problem because I know that if there were some semblance of sanity in the health system, if there were proper structures in place that allowed for better regulation, meaningful contininuous professional development and career progression etc, a lot of Nigerian Doctors abroad would start coming back to partner with those at home to piggy-back, as it were, our health system into the 21st century. The Indians are doing it and they are not better than us.

But sometimes I feel as if my not having had enough Nigerian 'experience' denies me the priviledge to talk about workable solutions. (Un)fortunately I didn't have the benefit of training in Nigeria for either my primary medical qualification or my specialisation. And other than my house job and NYSC couple of years, my work was mostly in the private sector, so it seems as if my exposure is inadequate and only gives one side of the (sad) story.

Perhaps, you (as somebody still 'holed up in the trenches') would be able to give a better perspective of what needs to be done to remedy the problem.

With regards to the Hippocratic (hypocrites) oath, I like to believe that once upon a time-bleary eyed and freshly out of medical school-I had, with left palm on my chest and sweaty right palm laid on top of a holy book, stood in front of a white bearded professor, whose eyes gleamed with pride at yet another colleague who has answered the call to serve humanity, while I-with heart bursting with enthusiasm and a burning fire in my bones-mouthed the promise of the oath to forever 'see in my patients nothing else than fellow creatures in pain'. Yeah right! Such sentimental crapola did not happen.

I remember that on graduation from medical school, any oath that i did take (the physicians oath) was in a very hard slavonic language in a country that did not officially believe in God; and the 'fire' that illuminated my eyes at that time had been ignited not by any selfless desire to go and be a charity worker but more by the fact that the world could be my oyster and I could finally start making returns on the investment that had been made in me! That, i think, is what motivates the majority of Doctors, everywhere in the world, and not any sentimantal altruism to go and serve.

I'm a microbiologist

Hello brothers and sisters in nairaland.I have a questions that're bothering my mind,the questions are:i have a fiance that i am planning to get married to,we both live in Thailand,she's a Japanese citizen.She's a qualified registered nurse and midwifery.She told me she would like to secure a nursing job in nigeria after getting married to me.But guys,how is the possibility of this?can she get a well-paid job in nigeria?pls advice me,thanks.

Hello brothers and sisters in nairaland.I have a questions that're bothering my mind,the questions are:i have a fiance that i am planning to get married to,we both live in Thailand,she's a Japanese citizen.She's a qualified registered nurse and midwifery.She told me she would like to secure a nursing job in nigeria after getting married to me.But guys,how is the possibility of this?can she get a well-paid job in nigeria?pls advice me,thanks

Ikedonn:

Hello brothers and sisters in nairaland.I have a questions that're bothering my mind,the questions are:i have a fiance that i am planning to get married to,we both live in Thailand,she's a Japanese citizen.She's a qualified registered nurse and midwifery.She told me she would like to secure a nursing job in nigeria after getting married to me.But guys,how is the possibility of this?can she get a well-paid job in nigeria?pls advice me,thanks

You may get a better response if you posed your questions to nurses on the wider forum.
You may also try contacting the Nursing and Midwifery council to clarify what she needs to do to be eligible to work as a nurse in Nigeria.
Here's their link http://www.nmcnigeria.org/

Good luck