Chief surgeon warned ministry about using UiTM route for specialist recognition

The UiTM programme was given provisional accreditation by the Malaysian Qualifications Agency in 2021.

PETALING JAYA: A senior cardiothoracic surgeon had warned the health ministry that it was an ill-conceived idea to recognise specialists under the parallel pathway programme using Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM).

FMT has sighted a letter from the health ministry’s chief cardiothoracic surgeon Dr Basheer Ahamed Abdul Kareem to health director-general Dr Radzi Abu Hassan dated Dec 12, 2023 in which the former warned of the consequences and legal implications of such recognition.

He said it could hinder the government’s efforts to improve healthcare and help patients waiting for heart surgeries.

UiTM has been given provisional recognition by the Malaysian Qualifications Agency (MQA) to enable the institution to conduct cardiothoracic surgeon training courses, with doctors who complete the programme then having to join the four-year Doctorate of Cardiothoracic Surgery programme before they can be listed in the National Specialist Register (NSR).

The Malaysian Medical Council (MMC) only places doctors in the NSR if the college is on its recognition list. Those not listed in the NSR cannot practise as specialists.

Basheer said these concerns were raised during a meeting on Nov 30, 2023, which was attended by representatives of the health ministry, the higher education ministry, UiTM, MMC, and MQA. The meeting’s attendees also included the original authors of the MQA Act, representatives of the Malaysian Association of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeons (MATCVS), and UiTM cardiothoracic surgery masters programme director Dr Zainuddin Wazir.

Basheer told Radzi there would be serious consequences due to the “unilateral” decisions made by the meeting’s chairman Sharifah Hapsah Syed Hasan Shahabudin, a former Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia vice-chancellor who is said to have been appointed by the then higher education minister to lead an independent committee to resolve the impasse involving the recognition of the parallel pathway specialists.

The MATCVS president claimed that during the meeting, Sharifah Hapsah said that UiTM’s parallel pathway training was illegal as it did not have full MQA approval.

“I had objected to it, arguing that Section 3(2) of the MQA Act stipulated that it (recognition) is not applicable to professionals. It (recognition) should be left to the relevant professional bodies, which in this case, is the MMC,” he said in the letter.

“Zainuddin was the one who proposed that the UiTM cardiothoracic surgery be the white knight route for the NSR recognition of parallel pathway graduates as MQA had given the programme a provisional nod.

“The chairman bulldozed the decision despite vehement opposition by some of us at the meeting. She even refused to record my opposition to the plan in the minutes of the meeting.”

Chairman orders MMC to reject NSR applications

Basheer said Sharifah Hapsah even directed acting MMC CEO, Dr Mohamed Anas Hussain, to reject applications from UiTM’s parallel pathway programme to be listed in the NSR.

“This action was a clear breach of protocol in the line of command existing between the health and higher education ministries,” he said.

Basheer said the plan was to get the doctors to join UiTM via an equivalency process advocated by MMC, which involved repeat examinations; completing anaesthesia, cardiology and respiratory rotations; logbook reviews; dissertations; theses; and research publications.

He added the duration of this exercise and fees involved were not disclosed at the meeting. Basheer said that using the UiTM programme as an equivalency benchmark was wrong as it had not been recognised by the MMC.

He added that it was relatively a more junior programme compared to the parallel pathway programme and remained in its early stages with no graduate trainees having been tested, compared to parallel pathway graduates who had worked in public hospitals and were more experienced.

He said the entry requirements were much lower than entering the parallel pathway programmes linked to royal colleges.

“The programme is expected to be considered for final registration by MMC just before the graduation of the first batch of trainees expected four years from now,” he said.

“On the other hand, cardiothoracic surgeons qualifying from the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh (RCSEd) have been recognised before, although the MMC has rejected recent applications by parallel pathway graduates who possess the same qualification,” he said.

Basheer warned that any attempt to stall the recognition of the current parallel pathway graduates goes against the interests of national healthcare, which is in dire need of specialists.

Basheer declined to comment further when contacted by FMT.