Volume 20, Issue 1
Message from the President:
The appeal to address manpower shortage from the Department of Medicine in Tuen Mun Hospital initiated a series of events in the medical circle. I attended a forum for Chiefs of Services (COS) of the Hospital Authority (HA) in the Head Office on 8 March evening chaired by Dr. P.Y. Leung, the Chief Executive, and Mr. Anthony Wu, the HA Chairman. The top management appeared to be taken by surprise in regards to the magnitude of the problem which spread beyond one clinical discipline. They were sincere and eager to find immediate or short-term measures to help the frontline doctors.
During the session, many COS presented their views and ideas in helping their staff. It was recognized that the staff morale had been poor since the segregation of salary scales and contract terms a few years back. With the improvement in the private market and increase in demand and workload in the public sector, it is natural to see specialists and senior staff leaving the public service. The increased demand in certain specialties, such as Obstetrics, Radiology, Orthopaedics, and Urology, just to name a few, resulted in brain drain crippling some areas of the public service. This is aggravated by decrease in number of medical graduates for the next few years starting from 2011. Despite a proposal to increase intake of medical students, it will take at least 12 years to see the beginning of any replenishment of specialists.
Volume 20, Issue 2
Message from the President:
This year we are celebrating the 20th Anniversary of the College. Like what we did 10 years ago, we are publishing a book to commemorate the 20th birthday and review the milestones of the past two decades. On behalf of the Council, I write to invite all Fellows and members of the College to our Annual Dinner on 19 November in the Academy Building, including all Past Presidents. It is the time to meet all old and new acquaintances.
The contribution of scientists to laboratory science in our practice has long been recognized. During the last ILCP meeting, I realized the close collaboration among pathologists and scientists, especially when I was told that pathology residents in the States are assigned to molecular laboratories run by scientists as part of their training. The Royal College of Pathologists in Australasia established a Faculty of Science to enroll scientists (including pathologists with contribution in Medical Science) as Fellows. In order to facilitate our further collaboration, it may be time to consider extending our family to our scientific partners. A survey has been carried out under the Credential and Appeals Committee (CAC) recently on the admission of scientists, under the instruction of the Council. Details of the survey are included in this Newsletter. Having discussed in our Council, we understand we do not have the resources to finance and support a separate faculty. Hence we may consider creating a new category, separate from our existing categories (Fellow, Member and Associate) to accommodate our new partners. I would like to discuss more on this aspect with you in the near future in an open forum. At this point so far, I would like to thank our CAC, chaired by Drs. Raymond YUNG and Edmond MA, for their effort in organizing and carrying out the survey.