If you are a newly passed physician in the Philippines, in my humble opinion, Family Medicine is the hot Specialty to take right now.
Let me tell you the reason why.
With the recent passing of the Universal Health Care Law (UHC), one of the major changes that will be implemented is this:
Every Filipino to a Primary Care Provider
- The UHC is a health care model that provides EVERY FILIPINO access to a comprehensive set of cost effective, and quality promotive, preventive, curative, rehabilative and palliative health services without causing financial hardship, prioritizing needs of the population who cannot afford such services.
- Salient Provisions: The DOH and Local Government Units (LGUs) shall endeavour to provide a health care delivery system that will afford EVERY FILIPINO A PRIMARY CARE PROVIDER that would act as the navigator, coordinator, and initial and continuing point of contact in the health care delivery system.
My Comment on this:
- Basically, the law is saying, EVERY FILIPINO shall need to register with a or primary care provider of choice.
- Like in other countries (Singapore, Australia, European countries, etc…) where everyone is registered to a GP (General Practitioner) the country’s first line of doctors that one should see, before he/she goes to a specialist. Basically, the GP would be the one to triage each person if they need further management of a specialist. Philippines’ UHC is adapting into this too.
- But in contrary, the definition of GP in those countries is different from ours. Currently GPs in the Philippines are any doctor who passes the medical board exams. Unlike in those countries, where GPs there are trained to be the first line of defense of any illness of a person of any age besides emergency cases.
- So, if we are going to compare apples to apples, Family Medicine Specialty is the one equivalent of GPs in other countries. No offense to GPs in the Philippines, I am a GP myself too. But, if DOH might be putting a lot more confidence to a PRIMARY CARE PROVIDER, it may require further training or years of experience before they can qualify a doctor to be a Primary Health Care Physician.
- If we do the math here, statistically, the population right now is about 104 Million Filipinos. The total number of Physicians in the Philippines is about 140,000. Only 88,000 of them are actively renewing their licenses as Physicians in the Philippines. Not all of those renewing their licenses are practicing clinically. There are some physicians in the health regulations (DOH), business, housewives and others are even OFW doctors. So we are probably looking only at 60K- 80K practicing Filipino doctors.
104M Filipinos vs 60,000 – 80,000 Doctors?
- We also need to consider that from those practicing physicians, most of them were already specialist doctors who do not see primary health cases anymore. Like, an Ophthalmologist who may not want to see a person with a chief complaint of Cough and Colds.
- If the entire population will be depending only to GPs (General Practitioners) and Family Physicians, there may not be enough doctors for everyone.
Things that are still needed to be considered:
- The specialist doctors also raise their concerns on how will be the referral system since if the UHC will be enforced; people cannot go directly to these specialists but should be referred by the Primary Care Provider of the patient.
- Another concern here is the GIDA (Geographically Isolated and Depressed Areas), I am referring to hard to reach places that no physician practices. How can we register them all to a Primary Care Provider if there are no Physician in the area? Who will be considered Primary Health care physician in these areas?
This reason alone would make the GP and Family Medicine Specialty a hot choice right now for newly passed physicians.
What are your thoughts if you are a Doctor practicing in the Philippines? Comment below.
For your Financial Health,
Read More:
- 4 Things Every Filipino Doctor Should Know About the Universal Health Care (UHC)
- 5 Reasons Why You Need to Have Green Book for Doctors (2nd Edition)
- Why are Most Filipino Doctors not RICH?
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Doc Pinky is a licensed Medical Physician, Internationally Registered Financial Consultant, Certified Investment Solicitor and Associate Wealth Planner and Estate Planner of the Philippines.
She loves to educate and spread financial literacy. She is a Lactation Consultant. She loves to travel. She is a devoted wife and mother.
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