Sarawak requires 18,814 additional healthcare posts to address a persistent shortage of doctors and specialists, particularly in rural areas.
KUCHING: Sarawak requires an additional 18,814 healthcare posts as the state continues to face a shortage of doctors and medical specialists, particularly in rural areas, the Sarawak Legislative Assembly was told today.
Sarawak Deputy Minister for Public Health, Housing and Local Government II Datuk Michael Tiang Ming Tee said the state currently records a doctor-to-population ratio of 1:590, compared with the national ratio of 1:406, reflecting the continuing shortage of doctors and specialists in Sarawak.
“As of April this year, a total of 5,738 approved healthcare posts in the state also remained vacant.
“The government acknowledges the persistent shortage of medical specialists in Sarawak and is addressing this through a comprehensive, system-based approach aligned with current Ministry of Health (MOH) policies,” he said during the Question Time session at the Sarawak State Legislative Assembly today.
He was responding to a question from Datuk Seri Wong Soon Koh (GPS-Bawang Assan) on plans to improve healthcare accessibility in both urban and rural areas amid the shortage of medical specialists.
Tiang said telemedicine had been expanded as a core strategy to optimise specialists’ reach, where this initiative allows patients to access specialist care remotely, reducing unnecessary referrals to tertiary hospitals, travel burden and waiting times.
He said rural healthcare delivery was also strengthened through the upgrading of health clinics, expansion of outreach services such as mobile clinics and flying doctor services, as well as the implementation of task-shifting involving medical officers and allied health personnel.
“To date, 176 or 65.2 per cent of primary healthcare facilities in Sarawak have been digitalised through systems such as the Cloud-Based Clinic Management System (CCMS), while 94 facilities are pending implementation,” he said.
According to him, Sarawak government had contributed RM10 million for information and telecommunication technologies (ICT) hardware procurement and infrastructure strengthening to support healthcare digitalisation across the state.
On healthcare workforce development, he said Sarawak had also sought broader authority from the Malaysian Medical Council (MMC) to recruit overseas-trained doctors and returning Malaysian specialists to serve in the state.
Meanwhile, during supplementary questions, Tiang said Sarawak currently has 97 mobile health teams covering 1,005 localities involving a total population of 102,267 people in rural and remote areas.
