Proposal to supplement postgraduate training in health
On the morning of November 20, the National Assembly discussed 3 draft laws including: Draft Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Education; Draft Law on Higher Education (amended); Draft Law on Vocational Education (amended).
Contributing opinions to the Draft Law on Higher Education (amended), delegate Tran Khanh Thu (Thai Binh Delegation) cited data, currently, in the national health system, there are 46,102 postgraduate doctors, including 35,394 specialist doctors (accounting for 77.8% of the total number of postgraduate doctors); 2,427 postgraduate pharmacists, including 1,647 specialist pharmacists (accounting for 67.9% of the total number of postgraduate pharmacists) and 1,844 postgraduate nurses, including 1,187 specialist nurses (accounting for 64.3% of the total number of postgraduate nurses). However, the CKI, CKII, and resident doctor degrees are not yet in the national education system.
"The health sector strongly recommends adding postgraduate training degrees in health fields to the national graduation certificate system so that more than 40,000 health workers have sufficient legal basis to recognize their trained degrees and towards international standard regulations" - delegate Khanh Thu expressed.
In addition, in Clause 1, Article 8, the delegate proposed to add Point d: d) Specific specialized training, postgraduate qualifications in the field of health to improve the professional practice capacity of learners to comply with the provisions of Clause 2, Article 8 of the Draft, which has been updated on regulations on the training program for granting degrees.
Proposal to tighten input quality, health sector training program
The second issue that Khanh Thu delegates contributed with related opinions is stipulated in Clause 3, Article 19 of the Draft Law on Higher Education regulating the establishment, division, and separation of schools and training units.
The delegate said that some areas need to have strict specific regulations in opening training majors right in the law, not only related to infrastructure but also the capacity and qualifications of lecturers in different majors. Therefore, it is extremely necessary to add principles right in the law because the quality of the output generation of training is very important.
"It is impossible for a doctor to be trained from an admission school with 25-28 points as well as a doctor to be admitted from the admission form or an admission score of only 15 points" - delegate Khanh Thu stated the reality.
From the above analysis, the female delegate suggested that the law should add a provision for health training institutions to ensure a vocational practice facility (practic hospital; not just laboratories and pre-clinical centers as currently regulated) to meet the specific nature of the industry and integrate internationally.
Along with that, to unify the above contents, the delegate proposed to add to Clause 11, Article 1 of the Draft to amend and supplement a number of articles on Education; "c) Training for specialized qualifications for students with university degrees or higher in a number of health fields".
Add 1 point in Clause 15, Article 1: ... as follows: e) The Minister of Health decides on higher education institutions specializing in health fields".
Sharing the same view, delegate Le Thi Thanh Lam (Can Tho delegation) suggested that the drafting committee should add regulations: Training programs for health sector approved by the Minister of Education and Training on the basis of coordination and professional assessment by the Ministry of Health.
This regulation helps ensure the training program of all educational institutions is unified nationwide, in accordance with the hospital system and ethical standards, clinical expertise, avoiding the situation of widespread training, not close to the requirements of the profession, while ensuring the synchronization between the Law on Higher Education with the Law on Medical Examination and Treatment and the Law on Pharmacy.
"Supporting medical knowledge and skills in accordance with the scope of the industry as prescribed by the Minister of Health, the participation in the assessment of the Ministry of Health will help better control the quality of training, overcome loopholes in clinical practice and improve the quality of the team" - delegate Thanh Lam expressed his opinion.
