70% of Moroccan medical students intend to leave the country after graduation, resulting in severe shortages of healthcare professionals, according to a study conducted by Moroccan researchers.
The European Journal of Public Health, in October 2021, published a study entitled “Migration intention of final year medical students” by 5 Moroccan researchers at Hassan II University’s Faculty of Medicine and Pharmacy, which examines the migration intentions of Moroccan students in their final year of medical school.
This research aims to discover why a considerable number of Moroccan medical graduates decided to leave the country in significant numbers to practice medicine abroad.
The researchers of the study, AK Sylla, El Ouadih, K. Barknan, S. Hassoune, and S. Nani, carried out a cross-sectional study during the month of January 2021.
This study included 251 Moroccans in their last year of medical school, who answered questionnaires submitted through Google Forms.
Researchers concluded that 70.1% of final-year students intend to leave Morocco after graduation, with women accounting for 63.6% of Moroccan immigrants.
According to the survey, most students cited the economic appeal of foreign countries as their main reason to leave Morocco, with 34% of the students considering Germany as a favorite possible future destination.
Factors that made medical students want to leave Morocco were quantified, along with those that pulled them towards international opportunities.
The students cited better working conditions (99%), better training (97.6%), and higher quality of life (97.2%) as some of the factors that influenced their decision to practice medicine in foreign countries.
According to the survey, the push factors included wage problems (97%) training problems (95.2%), and media criticism of doctors (83.6%).
According to the study, migration intentions were not significantly correlated with the socio-economic profiles of students.
Despite the fact that the country’s medical faculties graduate enough students every year to meet the country’s staff needs, the study’s findings deliver crucial insight into one of the main reasons why staff shortages remain a pressing concern at Moroccan hospitals.
In Morocco, the rate of doctors per 10,000 people is 7.3, whereas the recommended ratio is 15.3, according to the study.
Minister of Health Khalid Ait Taleb addressed the lack of qualified health professionals in Morocco in January 2022, noting that just 32,000 doctors and 65,000 nurses serve a population of 36 million.
The study proposed a solution to temper the problem of manpower shortage among the medical sector, stating: “The health policymakers should improve working conditions, training quality, and salary of health workers to reduce medical student migration.”
“Reducing the medical student’s migration is crucial to build and maintain a strong healthcare system,” the study concluded.
The survey is very explicit and significant. The question is how to address this problem and provide our country with a qualified doctors and nurses while the opportunities abroad are much better than in Morocco?
It is very ironic that futur moroccan doctors intend to leave their country while other foreign doctors are essaiming our hospitals!!!
For an academic perspective, this study is not serious. First of all it’s just about one university and in Casablanca ( not morocco), 2, The question were send and administrated on google form ( yes google form), The paper was published in unknown journal.
Conclusion, it’s not worth to be published in a serious News website like hespress.