CAMEROONIAN DOCTOR trained abroad

The integration or reintegration of Cameroonians doctors who followed their medical studies abroad is often fraught with many pitfalls, administrative, socio-economic and human. And yet, many are among these colleagues those who had to leave reluctantly, after one or several unsuccessful attempts to defy the very potent and are very « selective » entrance examinations to the FMSB (Faculty of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences), previously (University Health Sciences Center).

Has the difference of the colleagues forms locally which the path is any trace and the CDI with the public service provides, at least until now; these doctors from foreign universities must wipe: the absence or scarcity of a clear and precise regulation on their profile once income in this country, the anxiety related to the absence of immediate employment, the difficulties related to the research by their own means of courses called impregnation in the public health training, the prejudices of the local colleagues the recital to wrong as sub-forms, the next condescending of leaders of hospitals and other clinical to which they are forced to turn, the incomprehension of the family and friends and of the whole of society, for which « a doctor is a doctor », with all the consequences (especially pecuniary) that that implies, and multiple other daily concerns.

However, to force of courage, perseverance, selflessness, patience, compromise and sometimes compromises, these patriots often end up by carve out a path and be a place in the medical community active in Cameroon. Some even reach the highest spheres of the health and education.

The journey of these doctors are not unambiguous, we cannot describe accurately. We will therefore here the example of Mrs. A. C. B, through which several will be able to recognize, and which will be able to build several other.

– 1993: candidate unfortunate for the entrance examination to the FMSB. Obtaining on study of the folder, of an entry in the Faculty of Medicine in St. Petersburg, Russian Federation.

– 2001: end of medical studies in June, return to Cameroon in July. Any of suite faces the next malicious and the prejudices vis-à-vis the doctors trained in Russia, reputed to be of low level, forms in a communist country; this which did not facilitate the granting of a satisfactory professional situation. However, obtaining an internship of impregnation (condition if not qua non prior to any possibility of hiring contract) to the General Hospital in Douala, for an initial period of 6 months, which will expand indefinitely.

– 2003: after two years of a training course, which went on not, success in the contest of recruitment within the framework of the HIPC initiative, synonymous with future regimental ; assignment to the District Hospital (HD) of Bafoussam. Exercise as a primary care physician, not of salary during the first two years of doctor-HIPC !!! And assessments paid by the HD largely inadequate to the livelihood the more precarious. After the recall of wages at the end of two years, the perception becomes a regular activity but spaced: every 6 months!

– 2006: constitution of the application dossier of integration to the Cameroonian Public Service.

– 2008: obtaining the precious sesame, integration with the Cameroonian Public Service; assignment to the HD of Biyem-Assi . Success for the entrance examination in a cycle of specialization to the FMSB, discipline: Pediatrics, early lessons in October

– Currently: resident in 2nd year of Pediatrics.

So, A …… has spent 8 years in a foreign country and distant to study medicine, she has been through all kinds of vicissitudes: the learning of the language, the difficulties in understanding, the difficult climate, the solitude, the cultural shock, the rehabilitation in the education system, the scenery, the rejection, and many other things that may not understand that those who experienced them. It has endured all of this to obtain the degree of Doctor and come back to work in his country; and once at home she had to suffer even worse: feel foreign and rejected in his own country! Be done ironically called « Russian Physician » by his colleagues and compatriots! She has had to fight to acquire, conquer the right to exercise in his country, to prove that she was « Doctor any short « ; which has cost him two other additional years, and even after, the label was hard to take off. In his words, « this discrimination is nothing. There are weak, medium and good  students in schools in the world, the proof is that the staff of the promotion 2010 Pediatrics in the FMSB was born in a Russian university !… on the ground that is the job and the job well done that account »

This story is certainly that of many other physicians anonymous. However it should in no case discourage all doctors Cameroonian forms abroad and wishing to return serve the homeland, who should know that the doctors of local training also have their batch of difficulties. In fact, the multiplicity of medical training facilities recently opened, both public and private,  will led to competition on the labor market which, we hope, will rely on more objective criteria highly that the countries of the initial training of doctors.

MASSONGO MASSONGO