Addressing the physicians' shortage in developing countries by accelerating and reforming the medical education: Is it possible?

INTRODUCTION: Doctors' shortage has remained a concern worldwide. The developed countries started aids to recruit international medical graduates (IMG) to cope with the defects that the health care system suffers from; however, this solution may not work in developing countries that have a limited resource and poor budget to spend on the health care system. This study aims to present an alternative way to approach the physicians' shortage by accelerating undergraduate medical education and reform some post-graduate courses in order to cope with this problem.

METHODS: The literature in PubMed/Medline and Google scholar were searched using such keywords as undergraduate medical education, physician shortage, health care reform, physicians' performance, medical curriculum.

RESULTS: The finding revealed that performance during undergraduate medical school does not have a relationship with the physician's performance post-graduation. Moreover, the overloaded curriculum and the years spent in undergraduate education have a negative impact on the students in terms of burn out, and lack of competency, and loss of motivation in medicine. The method of education was found to have a positive effect on preparing good students and ultimately good physicians.

CONCLUSION: Since performance in undergraduate years does not have an impact on the practice post-graduation, the developing countries may consider the option of changing the context, and abbreviating undergraduate medical education as a solution for physicians' shortage dilemma. Moreover, modifying some post-graduate majors such as family physician, and general practitioner to allow the physicians enter the practice in areas of need is recommended.