No. just study hard, bring your brain and heart....

Alright thanks! Have a nice day

This post has been edited by Hunther: Apr 24 2017, 09:22 AM

I've copied this to my "Notes" to be referred to when this question arise. So many have asked things like "so what is he going to do for his masters?"

All I got to say here may offend many of the silent reader or even on going doc-to-be.

To answer your question. You have to understand the whole situation now.

You have your long tern goal and short term goal (which you already have), and keep up to date on how to survive... Best if having a local mentor or even some practicing doctor friends (quite hard to get).

Thing getting nasty because
- everyone can become docs. Provided you have the moolahh
- Training hospital is very very little. But the number of HO is massive.
- Syllabus of med school aren't regulated. And sometimes goes haywire. Some school expect you to learn by your own, but without a clear guidelines. End up wither study a lot of unnecessary or study too little.
- HO tenure is 2 years. Which is quite long.
- HO MO are underpaid IMHO.

Hope youre not the one who think doc = money

I don't know how the regulation of MOH going on. But many which I know even their SPM entry requirement having problems. MUET is another problems.

And those coming back from middle east, Russia, India, etc etc *but not sure now they still will be accepted into the system* you will have to fight with them. Beside those overseas, local private and local public.

Rotten apples are everywhere. Not only in medical field. And these people will drag down the images of HO, and if you're the good one, but your head will have doubt on you....

But before you think of the HO, think of the contract and how long to wait.... People say med student future are so bleak now. I don't know what to comment also...


Aiks, where I talk now. All taking irrelevant points. haha


But honestly I hope everyone studying med is doing well and can contribute to the community in come days.

yeah.. thats why undergraduate degree recognition is really important..
saves you alot of hassle..

to be honest, alot of it also comes down to experience and how much hands on you've done or been exposed to during your med school days.
You can study as much and be as passionate as you can but in the end, experiences and being safe play a bigger role here imo.

Errmm...
What I mean is what a 4th year medical student can do.

Hunther,
In the context of working/practising as medical doctors overseas for local trained, www.pagalavan.com or his books has all the appropriate guidance to your queries or overall scenarios you are/would be in.
UM and UKM main campus med degrees are recognised by Singapore Medical Council who are generally very welcoming so far.
Monash Malaysia med degree is recognised by Australian med council and a small number of her graduates gets offer for internships in Oz, but not for the rest.
Numed med degree is recognised by UK General Medical Council but unfortunately UK immigration rules doesn't permit its graduates into UK Foundation (housemanship) programmes.
Local med degrees other than above are required to pass respective national entrance exams or relevant 'professional memberships' as one of many other stringent (difficult to meet) requirements.
Please google for medical council/boards requirements of respective overseas countries .
Just my 2 sen.

Read..

Erm, have I lose the whole picture?
I don't see anything wrong with both of our statements.

Sorry for my bad English (I've been like a china pek all this while). I don't really understand what you mean by "read"

I responded to Hunther's post

by saying


Then, Jckc quoted me by saying


I don't see any conflict in both of our statement, so I echoed like this:



I did not object to his statement nor did I commented further.
Perhaps you can enlighten me?

jckc said hands on experiences as a student is more important, and you seem to disagree with him, as if implying jckc was referring to after graduation...

jckc is right, one of the reasons, and there are many, why so many housemans are incompetent, is simply they have little or no clinical experience...

in some overseas med schools, going to wards and seeing patients is "optional", and some may have ever clerked one or two patient only in their entire med school life...how can one, for example, explore a case in depth, with a russian patient, with a shallow level of russian language?....

so "No. just study hard, bring your brain and heart...." is not enough...this is not a theoretical course where you just study knowledge...

the same problem exists for students in ipts and some ipta...as they do not have their own teaching hospitals...many just leave the students in the crowded wards, with no guidance...and many have very few lecturers, and some of these lecturers are foreigners, most who not actively practicing medicine in msia, sometimes already for years....they are just teaching facts (which you can get from any text books), not the PRACTICE of medicine...

This post has been edited by limeuu: Apr 25 2017, 08:36 PM

Oh... now I understood.
It depends on what you mean by "hands-on". If your "hands-on" means history taking, examining patients, getting physical signs, figuring out basic investigations and drafting treatment plans (perhaps a little difficult), yes, I agreed with that completely.
But if your "hands-on" means procedures, I think should leave that till housemanship training.

Study hard, gives you knowledge.
The eyes can't see what the brain doesn't know.
Without knowledge, even there is an gross sign staring in front of you, you may also miss it.

Bring your brain, asks you think.
Without thinking, that's just something like monkey see, monkey do.
You saw something, you followed, but you didn't think. Eventually, you didn't really learn anything.

Bring your heart, ask you to have passion in this medical career, be both physical and mentally present.
Get your own initiative to see more patients, not to avoid difficult cases, that's how you learn.
The same applies to during housemanship, after becoming MOs or even speciality training. (sounds like cari pasal masa kerja)

which is why many of those who went to places with little clinical training, do learn quickly and eventually become competent...

but a combination of poor intellect, lack of interest, bad training, lazyness and low personal drive will result in grief....

4 out of the 5 can be picked up with reasonable accuracy BEFORE entering med school....

This post has been edited by limeuu: Apr 25 2017, 09:34 PM

Alright thanks a bunch!

Thank you for effectively putting things in an easily understood perspective.

Interesting points you mentioned there.
i definitely agree that plans are hard to make esp when youre worried of making a mistake.
But drafting a management plan should be part and parcel of medical school, at which it is the best time to practise what you have learnt into clinical practice. (since you will be supervised), especially in admission units where you will see and clerk the patients for the first time and the nurses will be chasing after you regarding management plans. The seniors will be busy seeing other patients as well so they have a level of expectations on you.

depends what you mean by hands on procedures as well, venepuncture, cannulation, catheter, iv lines, abgs are all necessary procedures to know and practise before you start imo. The faster you get better at them, the less time you spend doing them and your work doesnt pile up. (im struggling getting cannulas into frail old ladies in geris with thin veins which collapses easily and multiple needle puncture sites from daily bloods. defo need more practice)

This post has been edited by Jckc: Apr 26 2017, 02:20 AM

I'm not sure how medical school teaches a medical student drafting a management plan nowadays.
And I couldn't figuring it how - as almost none of house officers draft any management in their admission clerking.
I've seen one house officer's clerking, she wrote an excellent history, and some simple examination findings. But when come to the plan, she wrote just a simple phrase, "awaiting MO/specialist to give plan." Patient has anemia, she don't even bother to write for transfusion, of KIV transfusion.


From my past experience being a medical student, my lecturer did not bother to guide me much about management. The whole management idea was vague, and a little specific to the disease not patient's condition. I could only pick some, thanks to our Sarawak Handbook. To be exact, I learned how to come out with al management plan by reading our Sarawak Handbook.


People do struggle when come into setting branula in various situation. I only had 2 experience of setting a branula before my graduation. I struggled a little during my first week of posting, but eventually it was okay the subsequent weeks. Branula setting always needs a good basic anatomy of the vessels, and great patience. I think the most challenging line setting is neonates. Your struggle could have been relieved if your paediatric posting was earlier.

This post has been edited by sjr: Apr 26 2017, 07:31 AM

the training of a doctor in the old days was an apprenticeship...that is time tested, and it should still be...unfortunately, modern education, especially many "money making degree mills" have converted it into an academic exercise....

in good medical schools in well managed health care systems, it still is, and the process of transition from student to doctor blurs as they involve students early in the management of patients....

as an example, in australia, final year medical students are assigned to a firm/team, and in effect function like junior housemans...they clerk in the patients, and initiate investigations and treatment plans...all on the actual case notes...but of course, they are not registered practitioners, so all these will have to be vetted and countersigned by usually a registrar grade doctor.....the transition to an intern ( as they call houseman) is thus seamless...they just continue doing what they have been doing...

that is why, choosing a good medical school, in a good health care delivery system, is important...but then, the majority of msian med students will not qualify to enter these med schools in developed economies like uk/oz/spore anyway....even if money is not a problem...simply because they will not pass the stringent selection process these med schools practice....

An undergraduate with 6 weeks to finish med school in the UK recently said " I am going to miss final year...we do everything, and we don't have to sign for anything..."

Is it fair of me in saying that a lack of hands-on 'procedures' and incidences of initiating treatment plans during medical school 'training' days (i.e under competent supervision) is a strong indication of lack of 'general quality' of the said school ?

This post has been edited by zeng: Apr 26 2017, 09:18 PM