PUTRAJAYA: Malaysia needs a total of 44,804 assistant medical officers by 2025 to serve the country’s expected population of 36 million then, said Deputy Health Minister Lukanisman Awang Sauni.
Currently, he said, there are 23,329 assistant medical officers in the country, with a ratio of 1:1,400 population.
“The shortage of assistant medical officers causes an increase in workload as they have to work overtime. This indirectly affects the quality of health service delivery,” he said when opening Medical Assistant Day 2023 at the Health Ministry here yesterday, Bernama reported.
He said the number of medical assistants with degree qualifications is still small, at less than 10%.
Lukanisman added that the ministry has set a target of having 75% of them earn degrees by 2030.
He said several engagement sessions have been held with public and private universities to provide degree programmes to medical assistants.
Currently, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Universiti Sultan Zainal Abidin, and Open University Malaysia have special degree-level programmes for medical assistants.
He said Malaysia will host the Global Association of Clinical Officers and Physician Associates conference in Putrajaya in June.
