TALKING POINTS FROM THE MDCN REGISTRAR’S ADDRESS AT THE INDUCTION CEREMONY OF THE MBBS/BDS CLASS OF 2020
The Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria has previously requested all universities to establish a Faculty of BASIC CLINICAL SCIENCES and the University of Ibadan is still yet to follow this directive.
The registrar of MDCN, Dr T.A.B Sanusi in his opening remarks informed the graduands of the mandate he has received from the Council to not induct graduands of institutions yet to comply. In buttressing this point, he cited the ongoing 3-months delay that graduands of College of Medicine, University of Lagos have been experiencing as a result of this mandate.
Concerning the centralization of internship application: While stating that only Federal-Government owned hospitals are involved, Dr T.A.B Sanusi emphasized that the purpose of centralizing the distribution is not to post certain individuals to certain places anywhere. He informed graduands that applicants are requested to select their top 3 most preferred sites for house-job on the MDCN portal.
“If you are lucky and there are vacancies there, automatically you are through. The letters of appointment will drop to your mailbox and the institution. However, if there are no vacancies at your preferred centers, the system will bring up the institutions around the country where vacancies exist and you will have to select from the options”; he said. He highlighted at 30% of the spots in any hospital are reserved to graduands of its affiliated college of Medicine.
On the issue of strikes, he admitted that house officers are within their rights to embark on an industrial action or withdraw their services. However the code of medical ethics requires striking doctors to still fulfill their duty of care to patients that have been admitted or that will be needing emergency care.
“As house officers and by council policies, you are not members of ARD”; he emphasized. Twelve uninterrupted weeks must be completed in each of the four recognized departments that medical or dental interns are expected to rotate through
