Mental doctors? + amazing moon

How will you accept the fact that the doctor treating you, your parents or relatives are mental people? This was the question that popped into my mind when I read about this yesterday.

At least five doctors to suffer from mental woes every month

By M. KRISHNAMOORTHY

KUALA LUMPUR: Every month, at least five doctors are found to be suffering from mental illnesses, director-general of health Tan Sri Dr Mohd Ismail Merican said.

He said these doctors were either psychotic or neurotic but still managed to get into medical schools because these schools were not screening students meticulously enough.

“When the doctors complete their two-year housemanship and their applications are submitted for registration with the Malaysian Medical Council (MMC), they fail to get registered.

“Their supervisors do not certify them as fit to be registered because of indiscipline and poor attitude arising from mental health problems.

“The mental cases range from psychotic to neurotic. Psychotic cases include delusions and hallucinations, and neurotic behaviour includes anxiety, fear and anger due to the competitive environment,” said Dr Ismail.

These medical graduates, totalling about 60 cases a year, are unable to cope with their housemanship as they may have been pressured by their parents to take up medicine.

Dr Ismail said it was disheartening to note this emerging trend due to an inefficient selection process, adding that the mental cases were referred to the Medical Review Panel (MRP).

Since many of these graduates have spent a lot of money on their medical education, the MRP may extend their housemanship and at the same time send them for psychiatric treatment.

“In the event they are assigned to work, they will be thoroughly supervised and counseled by experts and given light duties until their mental condition improves.

“I am not so sure whether we can identify those with attitude problems during an interview unless such problems are obvious,” Dr Ismail said at a forum on Training Future Doctors: Have we got it right?”

About 2,000 medical doctors are registered annually from 21 local medical schools and 400 recognised schools overseas.

Different medical schools around the world have different selection criteria for their students, Dr Ismail said.

However, he said that the ministry was also planning some form of examination to check their attitude, knowledge and experience after they complete their final examination.

Most of the mentally ill students, he said, could have undergone pressure and depression while studying and faced difficulty in coping in a hospital environment.

The other weakness was a lack of proficiency in the English language.

Higher Education director-general Prof Datuk Dr Radin Umar Radin Sohadi said the ministry was currently reviewing universities’ curricula to ensure high standards in medical education and training for doctors.

“Uppermost on our minds will be the safety and well-being of patients,” he said.

What makes a doctor become mental? Long hours of on-call? Having to face so many patients at one go? Hospital environment? Stress?

In my opinion, genetic material does play a role. If a mother/father/grandparents have such mental history, there is a high chance that the grandchildren will inherit that mental gene. Yes, I do believe that some how, parents or grandparents passes those mental genes to the next generation. I have friends whose grandparents are mental, my friend's father is mental and her brother is mental.

So now the question is, what if a student who has history of mental cases in the family, opt to study medicine and he even gets the JPA scholarship. Is it fair? Who are paying for those JPA scholars? Tax payers? Government?? I am not sure but if the Government decides to look into this mental woes among the doctors, will they consider such facts?

I don't want to have my friends or relatives treated by mental doctors where they might not be able to make the right and best decision. We are talking about life and death, and it's not a small matter.

PS: It's 8.25pm, 1 Dec 2008 and the moon is amazing!! Why? See for yourself ^^

Zoom...

Smiley!!!!I moved the camera a bit and now the smiley face becomes a women's face, look at that sexy lips..LOL

Shake again and Voila!!!

Love this the most because...JJJsssss!!!!! Hahahaha
A picture from my fren's house view and it's not fake, a prove for steven who thought it was a fake =P

Even the night is smiling, is something good coming soon? Peace to the world? How I wish upon that smiley face ^^

PS: (Karen asked me to put) she said the stars makes her think of honey stars..swt..hahaha