Doctors suspect move to scuttle effort to save public from bogus specialists

Dr. R. P. Dayasena-July 27, 2018, 11:50 pm

The Association of Medical Specialists (AMS) accues ‘certain elements of the Medical Profession’ with vested interests of trying to put paid to the efforts being made to enact special laws to save the public from bogus medical specialists.

 The association says those in the medical profession and some trade unions have launched a joint operation to derail the process.

The following is the text of the statement issued by Dr. R. P. Dayasena, Secretary to the Association: Many of the developed countries have a mechanism to register medical specialists separately in their medical councils. This will help the specialists to be identified as a distinct category. The public will also be able to check with the medical council, the qualification and the status of a doctor, who claims to be a specialist.

In Sri Lanka there are many doctors practising as specialists in the private sector, without obtaining the stipulated certification by the appropriate authority. These are "bogus" specialists but no action could be taken against them as there is no specialist registry. There had been many instances in the past where bogus specialists have treated patients leading to disasters,

The Sri Lanka Medical Council as far back as 2006 recognised the need for a specialist registry and proposed the appropriate amendments to the medical ordinance.

These amendments were kept in the ministry for a long period but Maithripala Sirisena when he was the Health Minister, understood the importance of such registry, kindly agreed to take it as a priority to implement.

As a result several rounds of discussions were held with the Sri Lanka Medical Council, Ministry of Health, Association of Medical Specialists and amendment bill was prepared to achieve this objective. The draft bill was perused by the Legal Draftsmen’s Department and the Attorney General’s Department. With their clearance the bill was gazetted on 08.12.2017. This bill was presented to the Parliament on 17.07.2018. The approval of this amendment bill will empower the Sri Lanka Medical Council to maintain a separate register for specialists, which will be a major step forward in the regulation of the medical practice in Sri Lanka.

However, a group of trade unions in the ministry of health has called for countrywide trade union action to protest against this bill which is going to help the Sri Lankan public.

The Association of Medical Specialists would like to categorically state that this bill has no relevance whatsoever to the professions supplementary to medicine or any other profession, but the medical and dental officers registered under section 29 and 43 of the medical ordinance.

We have a strong suspicion that certain elements of the medical profession with vested interests, who benefit from not having a specialist registry, are instigating and sponsoring these groups to pressurize the Minister of Health, who has given his fullest co-operation up to now to get this bill to the Parliament.

The Association of Medical Specialists would like to make a strong appeal to the President and the Minister of Health not to give in to the pressure exerted by the unscrupulous groups in the health sector and to proceed with the proposed bill in the Parliament. As responsible citizens and qualified medical professionals serving the country we strongly condemn the organised attempts by certain individuals and groups to sabotage this important achievement which will be the first step to eradicate "quacks" from the medical profession. A quality medical care is the right of the citizen and the people who object to this bill are only committing treachery against their fellow citizens.