LAGOS – A pathologist, Dr Dayo Faduyile, said on Thursday in Lagos that consultancy titles should be restricted to medical doctors working in government-owned hospitals.
Faduyile, who is the immediate past Chairman, Nigeria Medical Association (NMA), Lagos State chapter, gave the advice in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN).
“In lay man’s term, anybody can be consultant. I can choose you as my consultant on press issue or journalism and a pharmacist can be a consultant for health in any institution.
“A consultant is a person who has the final decision on a patient; we cannot afford to have more than one way of giving direction.
“In a hospital setting, the word consultant means the bond between that patient and the physician who is taking care of him or her.
“So, pharmacists can take the title of consultant outside.
“Where we have had consultant pharmacists and consultant nurses, they are not hospital-based.
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“They are in offices – maybe old people’s home, mental homes, and in other places where doctors do not necessarily need to go on a day-to-day basis.
“But up till now, worldwide there is no place that support staff members are being made consultants in hospital settings.“
One of the demands made by NMA members before they embarked on an indefinite strike on July 1, was for the government not to allow other health workers other than medical doctors to append the title `consultant` to their names.
The association in a 24-point letter also urged the government to discontinue the recognition of non-medical doctors as Chief Medical Directors of university teaching hospitals in the country. (NAN)
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