St Kitts med students

Proper procedures should be established under which medical students of Universities other than the University of the West Indies (UWI) can access training at the country’s public hospitals. We have no problem with non UWI students being able to receive training at our hospitals, but clear rules must be laid down governing this rather than the approach which recently caused a measure of embarrassment at the San Fernando General Hospital. The University of the West Indies should have an input into any such arrangement, and any University wishing to have its students receive training here must be recognised by UWI. The procedures should also include the provision that for such training to be accessed, permission would have to be sought and gained from the Ministry of Health and/or the relevant Regional Health Authority.

The period of training will have to be specified, as well as the hospital in which this training is being sought. What happened at the San Fernando General Hospital recently in which students at the St Kitts’ Windsor University of Medicine were allowed to be trained there, outside of well established rules, should not be allowed to recur. The students were allowed in on the basis of what the Head of the hospital’s Accident and Emergency Department, Dr Stephen Ramroop, described as “verbal permission”. Regrettably, Dr Ramroop, as an article in Friday’s issue of Newsday pointed out, declined to name the person granting the permission. Meanwhile, a Consultant, Dr Anand Chatter-goon, who had been part of the programme to train the medical students, said he had ceased training them when he discovered that approval had not been granted by “higher authority.” We have no problem with medical students being trained at the San Fernando General Hospital or indeed any other public hospital, but as we stated earlier there must be guidelines set and the University of the West Indies should have a role in the establishing of those guidelines.
But such training should never be allowed to take place, not only in the absence of proper procedural arrangements, but certainly not on the basis of ‘word of mouth’ permission!

The more Caribbean people qualifying as doctors the better for the region. It has been made clear, however, that the burden of these medical students came from foreign countries. What we are faced with is a situation in which a Trinidad and Tobago taxpayer funded hospital and its facilities are being used for training persons who, on completion of their programmes, will merely likely say: Thank you and goodbye. Admittedly, no University can dictate to its graduates in which country they must work. However, because Trinidad and Tobago and the Region need more doctors, it would be better for the UWI to expand its medical training facilities to admit more students, many of whom may be inclined to remain here and provide taxpayers and others with the benefit of their training.