Local Exams For Ghanaian Doctors Trained Abroad

July 26, 1999

Accra, Ghana (PANA) - With effect from next October, medical professionals trained outside Ghana will be vetted before practising in the country.

Under the procedure, the Ghana Medical and Dental Council has instituted a system called "Pre-Registration Examination" to assess all foreign trained medical and dental professionals before registration. No practitioner will be recognised without writing the exams.

The chairman of the Council, Dr Christain Botchway, told a press conference in Accra Thursday that the procedure is in accordance with the Medical and Dental Decree of 1972.

It states that "council may, if it thinks fit in any particular case, require the person to pass such examination as council may prescribe prior to registration of that person under this decree."

Botchway said though the procedure is practised world-wide and locally by other health professionals, the first attempt by the council in 1987 was suspended after being described as a discrimination against certain practitioners, including those already practising in the country.

He explained that carrying out this exercise is not meant to victimise any particular group of doctors or dentists. Rather, its prime aim is to protect patients by insisting on high standards of health care delivery.

Botchway further explained that the examination, which will be at par with that of the Medical Schools in Ghana, will be in four parts and that candidates will prepare through a pre-orientation course "No doctor will be registered to practice without passing the examination."

He said doctors on short-term emergency and humanitarian visits to the country shall be exempted from the examination Revision courses will be organised for two weeks for foreign- trained doctors, comprising ward rounds and at least four hours of tutorials in Child Health, Medicine, Surgery and Obstetrician Gynaecology.

The pass mark is 50 percent and examinees must pass in all parts of the assessment - theory and orals.

The examination shall be held twice a year - February and August.