Health care clinics in Cambodia.

ABSTRACT

PIP Under the Pol Pot Khmer Rouge regime, most physicians with clinical experience were either killed or fled the country. The few practitioners who managed to survive were forced to hide their knowledge; much of that knowledge and experience is now lost. As part of a general process of national rehabilitation, Cambodia has trained since the 1980s hundreds of physicians and physician assistants. There were 700 physicians, 1300 physician assistants, and 4000 nurses in the country by 1992. Problems do, however, remain with medical education in Cambodia. In particular, the medical texts and lectures are in French, a language which very few of the younger generation speak; instructional texts are designed to meet the needs of developing nations, not a rehabilitating one like Cambodia; emphasis is upon curative health care, hospitals, and vertical programs instead of primary and preventive health care; Cambodian physicians are used to a system based upon the division of patients by ability to pay instead of by age, disease, or need; corruption has grown as the cost of living has outstripped the level of official salaries; and there is neither professional contact, feedback, nor program evaluation within health care programs. The authors is a resident in obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Chicago who worked at two clinics during a stay in Phnom Penh. She recommends that instead of simply training more doctors, these training-related problems should be addressed, including a revision of the curriculum to include both primary health care medicine and psychiatry. Moreover, people in Cambodia need to be taught the importance of preventive health care, which should then reduce the number of visits to physicians. This process will be accomplished more effectively with the cooperation of physicians, the government, nongovernmental organizations, and international organizations associated with health care.^ieng