Mekong delta short of specialized doctors

The Mekong delta has 152 doctors of five rare specialities and by 2020, over half of senior doctors will retire, said participants at the meeting medical personnel training for the region held by the Medicine University and the Southwestern region Steering Committee.

Illustrative image. Photo: Hanh Nga

13 Mekong delta provinces have 13 forensic centers with only four forensic surgeons while the rest of medical workers are different majors.

For instance, no tuberculosis doctors work in Kien Giang Province while five other provinces have no surgeons specializing in tumor.

A health representative in the region highly appreciated training of medical students to meet the increased demand petitioning that training should maintain to supply more medical workers for infirmaries in the region.

In 2017, the Medicine University Can Tho plans to train 1,060 doctors and pharmacists, and bachelors majoring in general medicine, testing

Averagely, the number of doctors and pharmacists increased from 6.64 and 1.03/ 10,000 people to 7.2 and 1.22 in 2016. It is scheduled by 2020, the figure will be 9 and 2/ 10,000 residents. In 2017, the Can Tho Medicine University would have to train 1,300 doctors.

Worse, the region is facing a serious shortage of doctors specializing in tuberculosis, mental illness, forensic and surgery.

(Source: SGGP)