KARACHI: A technology-driven initiative by one of the oldest public sector medical universities in the country has succeeded in bringing back to profession 700 Pakistani lady doctors. These doctors, who have been brought back to practice within the past 18 months, had quit the profession due to family or social issues.

The initiative named ‘eDoctor’ by the Dow University of Health Sciences (DUHS) is an attempt to make around 35,000 female doctors, who completed their medical education at the expense of the state or privately but they are no more associated with the profession, once again part of the country’s medical workforce.

According to officials and professionals, among these 700 Paki­stani lady doctors are also those wom­en who are now live in foreign countries. They say departure of such a large number of lady doctors from the profession has widened the gap between demand and supply in the country’s healthcare and medical services mostly in low-income communities.

According to the health officials and professionals, on an average Rs5 million is spent on the education of a doctor. Bringing these 700 lady doctors back to profession means Rs3.5 billion of the state or parents has been retrieved and injected in the healthcare system of the country.

DUHS ‘eDoctor’ project aims to make around 35,000 lady doctors, who have quit practice, part of country’s medical workforce

The IT-enabled lady doctors, they say, can play a significant role in providing backend health advisory in order to prevent maternal and new born mortality rate, support population planning campaign, polio and epidemics like dengue and typhoid.

“The project is catering to the uplift for currently out of work lady doctors, who have been out of professional practice due to their family or social issues,” said Prof Dr Jehan Ara Ainuddin, academic head of eDoctor and the head of obstetrics and gynaecology at the DUHS. “The concept has been designed to use the innovative technological tools in reconnecting these out of work lady doctors on a single platform, provide them virtual based teaching of new and updated medial education in form of a reach programme covering all aspects required to be general physician.”

She said the idea worked when the university entered into a partnership with technology company Educast that specialises in technology-based remote training and in 18 months more than 700 female doctors, including 284 those who are settled abroad, were mobilised to serve the country. The number of lady doctors, Prof Jehan Ara hoped, was likely to increase manifold in the days to come with awareness among those medical professionals who had quit the practice but still felt urge to resume it at their convenience.

A recent study conducted by a non-government organisation suggests that there are around 35,000 female doctors who have completed their education at the expense of the state or privately but they are not part of the medical workforce in the country. The ‘eDoctor’ project is aimed at bringing them back to profession mainly to serve the low-income and rural areas through technology.

According to Educast’s founder and CEO Abdullah Butt, there are thousands of Pakistani lady doctors who after completing their medical education are just now raising their kids and looking after their families and they are not contributing to society through their skills and expertise.

“In few months, hundreds of such lady doctors have been brought back to their profession through the use of latest EdTech platform, using Flip Model teaching and Interactive Digital Trainings over newer healthcare models and updated medical practices taught by top medical faculty from DUHS.”

The project, he said, had been endorsed by leading organisations of the country, which included the federal health ministry and the Sindh health department. Through ‘eDoctor,’ hundreds of out of work lady doctors from Pakistani cities and rural areas as well as foreign countries, including Bahrain, Greece, the United States and Indonesia, have been motivated to once again join their profession.

“Such lady doctors, who are willing after getting awareness, go through latest educational and virtual digital technology, where they are also required to conduct live video-based patient consultations, clinical rotations with medical consultants in Pakistani hospitals,” said Mr Butt.

“They are equipped with hands on trainings on basic life support and obstetrics and gynaecology, attachments with clinics, use of electronic medical records and handling of video assisted mobile health assessment collaborative platform. They are awarded online certification programme of six months enabling them to get updated knowledge in various fields under certification with 30-CME credit hours as “Family Medicine Certificate” that enables them to provide basic healthcare advisory even from their home.”

Published in Dawn, November 25th, 2019