Some 40 Nepali doctors are vying to be admitted at the state-run Bicol Medical Center in Naga city, where they will be assigned to departments including pediatrics, surgery and internal medicine, a national broadsheet said.
The Nepali doctors will undergo their residency training for four years, but will not be allowed to practice privately in the Philippines. They will pay about 3,000 dollars each for a chance to train with Filipino doctors in a hospital system largely molded on the US model, it said.
Ruben Penafrel, officer in charge at the hospital, said some of the Nepali doctors may be asked to extend their stay to help solve "the severe shortage of doctors at government hospitals".
He said another hospital in the central Philippines was considering taking in more than 30 Nepali doctors.
About 1,000 Nepali doctors look for residency each year in medical facilities across Asia based on the US system to sharpen their skills and because there are only a few hospitals in their country, the report said.
The Philippines meanwhile is experiencing a shortage of doctors amid a mass exodus of physicians to the United States, where they get higher pay. Others retrain to become nurses, who are in short supply in the US, the Philippine Medical Association says.
Since 2000 some 11,000 Filipino doctors have gone back to medical school to retrain as nurses, more than half of whom have already landed jobs in the US, the group says.
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