You’ll be glad to know on your travels: The Peninsula On-line: Qatar’s leading English Daily.
Training in emergency medicine made compulsory for private sector physicians
Doha: Physicians having their own practice or those employed by private clinics will now have to compulsorily undergo one of the six emergency medicine courses, the Ministry of Public Health has stipulated in a recent circular.
The completion of such a course is mandatory for such physicians to renew their practicing licenses, the Al Sharq daily, reported.
According to the report, the courses are: Cardiac and respiratory resuscitation, accidents and emergency first aid, instant resuscitation, treating emergency child birth cases, resuscitation of neonates and paediatric emergencies.
Such courses were made compulsory for private medical practitioners following a case where a child lost his life since the physician was not aware of the proper treatment in an emergency, the report adds.
The MPH had since cancelled the physician’s practising licence, it added.
There, that’s reassuring. It’s at least better than ‘multi-culti awareness’. Travel away!
Well, I’m all in favour of doctors being able to handle emergencies. But it sounds like they’re insisting on “merit badge” courses for guys with office-based practices whether or not they’re ever likely to encounter an emergency. Sure the GP should be able to do basic handling of any emergency, but the dermatologist? The psychiatrist?
Reminds me a little of a guy I worked for as a medical student-he was a general surgeon with a critical care fellowship as well as acting as one of the trauma team leaders, but he officially wasn’t allowed to respond to codes in the hospital, because he didn’t have a current BLS (Basic Life Support, essentially the same CPR training course most security guards have to take) certification.