NON-DOCTORS CAN BE MEDICAL CONSULTANTS IN NIGERIAN TEACHING HOSPITALS

Postgraduate training will award a degree certificate. This degree is different from the undergraduate degree. The degree certifications of the undergraduate and postgraduate education are so wide and different that a medical practitioner could obtain a postgraduate degree in a non-medical field, provided that the requirements for that postgraduate admission allowed basic medical degree.
Some times, a basic medical degree could be used for admission into a non-medical degree via direct entry route, still provided that the requirements for the direct entry into such basic non-medical degree allowed medical degree.

Thus, as a requirement for reading law (LLB), the direct entry requirements allow MBBS certificate with a credit pass in Literature in English. Extending this to postgraduate training, a medical practitioner could obtain a PhD.

However, obtaining PhD does not equate to having Bsc in Philosophy. The summary is that obtaining a higher degree in another field of endeavor does not equate to certification in the basic fields of that area.

The National Postgraduate Medical College placed as one of the requirements for residency program as obtaining Primary in any of the faculties. It went ahead to list the requirements for qualification to write primaries into the residency program as:

1. Passport Photograph (Colour) in JPEG Format taken in the last six (6) months in front of a plain white or off-white background and in full-face view directly facing the camera
2. Basic Medical or Dental Degree Certificate (To be uploaded in PDF Single Page)
3. NYSC Discharge or Exemption from NYSC Certificate/Letter (To be uploaded in PDF Single Page) Not Mandatory
4. MDCN Provisional Registration Certificate (To be uploaded in PDF Single Page)
5. MDCN FULL Registration Certificate/Receipt of Payment for MDCN FULL Registration Certificate (To be uploaded in PDF Single Page ) Not Mandatory
6. Current Annual Practicing License/Receipt (To be uploaded in PDF Single Page )
7. NPMCN Fellow’s Recommendation Form (To be uploaded in PDF Single Page)
8. Evidence of change of name (To be uploaded in PDF Multiple Pages [At least four (4) Pages [To include Application letter for change of name, Marriage certificate, Sworn Affidavit and Newspaper Advert])
9. Candidate Indemnity and Declaration Form (To be uploaded in PDF Single Page)

It is not intended that the meaning of medical doctor be overflogged in this article. That has been done in many prior articles on this blogspot.

It must be noted that while section 10 of the National Medical College Act, together with portions of the Medical and Dental Practitioners Act, appears to engender dichotomy between medicine and Dentistry, the new Residency Act which is later in time, submerged qualification for residency into one bundle of requirements, thereby making both dentists and medical doctors equally entitled to apply for any postgraduate medical specialization. The summary of the foregoing is that access to residency program is not limited to medical practitioners alone.

Non medical practitioners can undertake residency program. Residency training is therefore open to both medical and non-medical practitioners. Residency training program in any field of medicine can therefore be undertaken by both medical and non-medical doctors. Based on the requirements for qualification to write Primaries, both medical doctors and dental surgeons are qualified to apply for Primary in any field of medicine and surgery. Therefore, a medical practitioner could apply for postgraduate dental surgery, and a dentist could apply for Primary in Paediatrics. At the end of the day, the postgraduate graduand will become a fellow in that field.

The postgraduate graduand will still remain what he was. If the Paediatrics Fellow was a dentist, Fellowship in Pediatrics does not confer on him the title of medical doctor. If the Dental Fellow was initially a medical practitioner, Fellowship in Dental Surgery does not confer on him the title of dentist.
This arrangement is a good entry point into medical specialization by dentists who prefer the field of medicine, as well as for medical practitioners who prefer the field of dentistry at the specialist level.

Thus, if you are not admitted into medicine, just go into dentistry. Channel all your children who could not be admitted into medicine into dentistry. Let them graduate as dentists and apply for residency in Obstetrics and Gynecology. In the end and until the Medical and Dental Practitioners Act is amended to include Doctor of Dentistry,  the dental gynaecologist will answer MR DENGYN. This avenue has never been exploited before now.

Awkadigwe Fredrick Ikenna
08039555380
awkadigweikenna@gmail.com