Are
Indonesian physicians ready for
ASEAN
Economic community?
Tommy Dharmawan ; A physician in Jakarta
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JAKATA
POST, 06 Desember 2014
Next
year, a few weeks from now, Indonesia will face the realization of Asian
Economic Community (AEC) policy. More and more professionals, including
foreign doctors, will come to Indonesia and have practices here. The AEC will
remove substantially all boundaries on trade so that ASEAN will become a
region with liberated movement of services, investment and skilled labor,
including in the healthcare sector.
Before
the AEC policy many Indonesians went to other countries to seek better
healthcare services. According to the Health Ministry, in 2014 more than
600,000 Indonesians went abroad to seek medical assistance, especially to
Singapore and Malaysia. Indonesian patients have contributed more than US$600
million to those countries every year since 2003. Next year, many foreign
physicians are expected to open practices in Indonesia.
Many
physicians here are still skeptical and defensive toward this policy. The
pessimists state they will lose their patients, assuming Indonesians trust
foreign doctors more. This would be because other countries’ medical
professionals provide better quality aid, hospitality and professionalism
than that perceived in Indonesian medical services.
Moreover,
Indonesian doctors still think that their position is higher than that of
their patients, so they do not care about their patients’ needs or privacy;
this problem affects communications between doctors and their patients.
Healthcare specialists are like any other professionals; this job needs the
trust of its clients. Indonesian doctors should change their attitudes so
clients will trust them.
Lack of
time to communicate with the patient and practicing in many places are two
reasons why hospitality and professionalism of Indonesian doctors has
decreased. Many of our physicians practice late into the night with many patients
and at several places. To prevent Indonesian doctors from practicing in
multiple places, government and the private sector should raise their pay.
Optimists
say, to the contrary, that Indonesian customers are still quite confident in
the reputations of Indonesian doctors. Despite some reports about
malpractice, Indonesian doctors have the advantage of knowing the local
language and are very familiar with tropical diseases that affect most
Indonesians.
To
practice here legally foreign physicians still need to pass examinations held
by the Indonesian Medical Council, including one on the Indonesian language.
The main
reason why the test for foreign physicians is quite difficult is ultimately
to protect Indonesian customers. How can a doctor treat the patient if the
doctor does not understand the patient’s language? If we correctly interview
a patient about the symptoms and history of an illness this would contribute
to around 80 percent of an accurate diagnosis.
The last
reason is related to the implementation of the universal health coverage, ,
which many aspire to. If it still involves cooperates with only Indonesian
doctors, many Indonesians will still choose Indonesian physicians.
Local
physicians would only have themselves to blame if customers shift to foreign
physicians.
Cooperation
with ASEAN countries is a must in the AEC era. With cooperation, Indonesia
can organize the facilitation of medical professionals’ mobility within ASEAN,
enhance exchange of information and expertise on standards and
qualifications, promote adoption of best practices for professional medical
services and provide opportunities for building capacity and training medical
practitioners.
In 2008
Indonesia implemented a new medical practice law. Our country already has a
council known as the Indonesian Medical Council that regulates, monitors and
maintains the quality of physicians. In the AEC era, the task will be also to
monitor foreign physicians.
From
experiences in Europe, a national medical council must work hard. In the
European Union, for instance, a physician punished and fired from his
profession in one country could still practice in another country. Now Europe
wants to install a Europe-wide alert mechanism to prevent such occurrences.
The
Indonesian Medical Council should have cooperation with all schools of
medicine in Indonesia and impose on them worldwide standards of medical
education. Lack of communication and empathy are among the complaints of many
patients in Indonesia. So, those skills should be enhanced in the Indonesian
medical school curriculum.
Last
week in a discussion at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of
Indonesia, Akmal Taher, the directorate general at the Health Ministry,
stated Indonesia is not worried about the AEC policy to liberalize the
movement of foreign doctors to our country.
He said
the goal of this policy is to make Indonesians get the best medical service
available. Thus, local physicians would only have themselves to blame if
customers shift to foreign physicians. They should be angry at themselves
over why their level of competency and skills lag behind foreign doctors.
The AEC is a reality and foreign doctors will work in Indonesia soon.
So it is high time for Indonesian doctors to change their attitudes and
improve their competence to make more people trust their quality service.
This is a challenge that must be answered to prevent the dignity of
Indonesian doctors from shattering into pieces. ●
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