With the recent upgrades of federal medical centres to teaching hospitals and the establishments of more FMCs and with the mass exodus of Nigerian trained medical doctors, opening a widow for the recruitment of medical and health workers to fill the vacuum, it is indeed a sad development having quacks abroad to fill the identified gaps.
It is a good development questioning the rationale behind sending Nigerians to some so-called universities abroad to train as medical doctors only to return home as unqualified.
It is indeed an unhealthy development that a total of 439 foreign-trained medical and dental graduates have failed the assessment examination conducted by the Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria.
The two-day assessment examination was conducted on November 23 and November 24, 2022, at the Usmanu Danfodiyo University Teaching Hospital, Sokoto.
The council’s Registrar, Dr Tijani Sanusi, disclosed this in an exclusive interview with the Punch on Sunday.
Sanusi said 916 foreign-trained medical and dental candidates sat for the assessment examination but only 477 candidates passed.
“24 candidates sat for the examination in Dentistry, eight passed and 16 failed. 892 candidates sat for the medical examination, 469 passed and 423 failed,” he explained.
Describing the assessment examination as a global practice, Sanusi said no professional is allowed to practise in another jurisdiction without sitting for the examination.
He explained, “It is a global practice that if you train in a particular jurisdiction and you want to go to another jurisdiction, you subject yourself to an assessment examination.
“Even if you are a Professor of Medicine here and you have never practised in the United Kingdom or the United States, when you go in there, you subject yourself to their assessment examination.”
MDCN assessment examination is compulsory for all foreign-trained doctors who plan to practise in Nigeria.
MDCN regulates the practice of Medicine, Dentistry and Alternative Medicine in the country in the most efficient manner that safeguards the best healthcare delivery.
The assessment examination is meant for foreign-trained medical doctors and dental surgeons who want to practise in Nigeria and it tests the candidates’ ability to apply their basic medical sciences and clinical skills in a healthcare setting.
The examination is to ensure that foreign-trained doctors show themselves capable of practising in Nigeria.
On passing the examination, they are given a provisional licence to practise in Nigeria.
It is this provisional licence medical and dental graduates will use to practise during their one-year housemanship after which they are given a licence of full registration.