ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) has decided not to register any FCPS degree holder who fails to submit his or her mark sheet.

The decision to collect mark sheets, along with degrees, has been taken after it was revealed that as many as 2,000 degrees were issued to professors without exams.

Fellowship of the College of Physicians and Surgeons (FCPS) is a post graduation specialisation. FCPS can be done in many fields. College of Physicians and Surgeons Pakistan (CPSP) is responsible for the registration of postgraduate doctors of Pakistan. It makes rules, enrols doctors and conducts exams for the FCPS in Pakistan.

A mark sheet is a certificate on which marks of all subjects are mentioned whereas the degree only mentions that the student has cleared the exam. So PMDC cannot confirm whether the student actually cleared the exam or it is just an honorary degree.

It is pertinent to mention that, according to estimates of PMDC, as many as 80,000 people are involved in quackery or are working as doctors on basis of fake degrees in the country.

In May, PMDC decided to register the doctors and issue them a special registration number. It was further decided that after their registration, the doctors have to mention their registration number on prescriptions and use that number for correspondence with PMDC.

An official of PMDC said that most of the doctors were sending their degrees to get registration numbers. During the registration it was learnt that as many as 2,000 degrees of FCPS have been issued to the doctors without any examination. However CPSP terms them ‘honorary degrees’.

“We investigated the issue and reached a conclusion that those degrees cannot be called honorary degrees. Honorary degrees are given to politicians, academicians and other persons who excel in their fields, but FCPS degrees without clearing exam are awarded to mostly non-deserving people,” he said.

Registrar PMDC Raja Amjad Mehmood said that there is a big difference between an honorary degree and an awarded degree.

“Since many years, FCPS degrees have been awarded to blue-eyed specialists from all over Pakistan. These degree holders have never undergone these FCPS trainings and have never appeared in the pre-requisite examination,” he said.

“It seems that it has been done with the objective of enhancing CPSP’s vote bank, as those heads can instruct doctors working in their hospitals to give a vote to the candidate of their choice,” he said.

He further said that only those FCPS holders will be registered whose training institutes are also recognised by PMDC and are included in Schedule III of PMDC Ordinance 1962 by Ministry of National Health Services.

Talking to Dawn, Dr Amjad said two notices have been served to CPSP to cancel honorary degrees but so far the PMDC has not received any response.“On Wednesday, a letter was sent to the Secretary National Health Services Rashida Malik to intervene and take action against doctors who have been using their honorary degrees as their routine studies,” he said.

Published in Dawn, July 17th , 2014