Medicine: a journey worth the challenge

JUNIOR Junior medical doctors in South Africa will be tested from the moment of their inception as they learn to survive. The public healthcare system in South Africa is a high-pressure environment, fraught with many challenges, which initially may seem daunting to the Ist year intern.

- DR ISHQ PRAMCHAND:

Such challenges, I feel, are integral to personal growth and significantly contribute to resilience in the field, which will carry you throughout your medical career and beyond.

I have had the privilege of gaining invaluable exposure to our healthcare system at grass-roots level. Having graduated summa cum laude and top achiever of the class of 2021 at the Nelson R Mandela School of Medicine, | pursued a rigorous 2-year Intern-ship programme at King Edward VIII Hospital in Durban. I, thereafter, completed 1 more year as a community service medical doctor at Charlotte Maxeke Hospital in Johannesburg.

Now, I find myself "catching my breath" as I locum privately in Durban and await a registrar position in my specialty of choice.

Medicine is not easy. The pathway may seem simple but is a complex, transformative process geared towards shaping a competent, safe medical doctor. Seemingly endless hours of studying, tough examinations and a dwindling social life set a strong foundation for the future: draining night shifts, life or death situations, and the optimism to keep going and never give up.

The reality does not make it any easier.

Nationally, South Africa faces a critical shortage of doctors, with less than one doctor for every 1 000 patients. This precarious imbalance places strain on the frontline doctors in the public health sector, exacerbated by the limited access to medical resources. While South African medical doctors are trained excellently in local institutions, which match international standards, poor patient outcomes are often the result of suboptimal care.