PESHAWAR: The health department has decided to terminate the services of the consultants of medical teaching institutions as its employees.

       They will be asked to work with the respective MTIs only in line with their employment contracts, officials of the department told Dawn. They said many consultants violated the law by working with the health department and MTIs simultaneously as they were supposed to resign from government jobs after appointment to the teaching institutions.

       The officials said the crackdown on dual jobs would begin from MTI Khyber Teaching Hospital, where 40 medical specialists had working as assistant professors, in addition to their jobs in other institutions directly managed by the health department.

       When contacted, health secretary Mohammad Tahir Orakzai disclosed that the department had started work to identify such doctors for disciplinary action.

       They will work with teaching institutions only, say officials

       “After we receive the information and complaint against the Board of Governors (BoG), the health department will identify them for en bloc action as under the Medical Teaching Institutions Reforms Act, 2015, they cannot perform two jobs at the same time,” he told Dawn. He said under the law, the MTI employees had got service protection.

       “We have to support the health system and benefit the people. The consultants hired by the health department or MTIs should work in accordance with the law,” he said.

       The secretary said those working with the health department or MTIs were appointed by the government, which would ensure that all work properly to ensure better patient care.

       He said the MTI policy board had already asked medical specialists to quit their health department jobs, but most of them didn’t comply with the instructions.

       “We have to ensure that those doing jobs in two places retain their MTI job,” he said.

       Mr Orakzai said lists of such doctors would be prepared in consultation with MTIs and those found to be doing two jobs at the same time would be de-notified by the health department.

       The government had enforced the MTIRA in 2015 granting financial and administrative autonomy to teaching hospitals in the province to improve patient care.

       Until now, the law has been extended to 11 hospitals and their affiliated colleges. Under the law, the MTIs are managed by the respective boards of governors, which take key decisions.

       The MTIs have recruited specialist doctors as assistant professors for a three years period on renewable contractual basis against the monthly payment of Rs250,000. The law has bound them to work with MTIs only. They are also barred from doing private practice outside hospitals.

       Under the law, all MTIs have begun institution-based practice (IBP) in the evening. Patients are examined by doctors privately.

       Officials said many consultants didn’t want to do IBP and illegally ran private clinics. They said the MTIs had been issuing such staff members notices from time to time, but to no avail.

       The officials said the MTI consultants continued to skip IBP and secretly do private practice outside hospitals. Dean of the Khyber Teaching Hospital Prof Mahmud Aurangzeb told Dawn that his hospital had issued two notices in Sept and Oct asking consultants to stop private work and take up IBP.

       “They [consultants] have signed contracts promising they will do MTI jobs as well as IBP, but out of 60 consultants, 40 are doing private practice outside hospitals. The rest are doing the IBP diligently,” he said.

       Prof Mahmud said such doctors wanted to work as civil servants and MTI consultants at the same time violating the law.

       “We have conveyed our reservations to the health department about this illegal practice and hope for the issuance of a notification about it,” he said.

       Published in Dawn, December 19th, 2021