The Ministry of Health has deployed 94 new doctors and 74 interns to different hospitals across the country.

Speaking at the send-off ceremony in Kigali, yesterday, Patrick Ndimubanzi, the state minister for health, said the new doctors would increase manpower, hence improve service delivery to patients.

Ndimubanzi urged the doctors to maintain the honour of their profession, make efforts to learn more, and pay close attention to the needs of their patients, as well as working as a team.

"From the past, a doctor used to be a respected person because our work is not easy. That respect still stands to-date. We have to maintain it by always continuing to learn, working hard together, understanding each other as doctors. Make efforts to communicate with patients, caring for them, listening to them. They prefer one who listens to them to one that is highly qualified by does not show empathy,” he said.

Ndimubanzi added that the number of doctors is increasing and the nation is on track to have enough in the future.

According to Ndimubanzi, Rwanda has about 1,000 doctors in general medicine and 400 others who are specialised in specific fields.

He said the doctors have been deployed to the different hospitals with a target of every hospital having up to 10 doctors.

Asked about the doctors’ welfare, Ndimubanzi said the Ministry of Health was working with different institutions to ensure better remuneration for them.

The interns will also work for a year in different hospitals under supervision.

According to Dr Fiacre Mugabe Byiringiro, one of the newly-deployed doctors, it is their turn to put all that they have been trained in practice as they help to provide medical services to Rwandans.

Byiringiro appreciated the government’s efforts to increase the number of medical doctors in the country and expressed optimism that in three years, doctors’ shortage will be history. 

editorial@newtimes.co.rw