Healthy growth in registered doctors – Malaysia

In February 2019, Malaysia ranks first in the category of Best Health Care in the International Living Annual Global Retirement Index 2019. It is a good news as it portray Malaysia in a positive tone after the infamous 1MDB scandal and the unfortunate MH370 and MH12 tragedies.

The amount of registered medical doctor in the nation has a major hike in 2016. It grew from 46,491 registered doctors in 2015 to 50,087 registered doctors in 2016. The number of doctors in Malaysia increase by 3,596 people during that period.

The state with the highest number of registered doctors is undoubtedly Selangor. It is most developed state in the nation.

On the other hand, Sarawak has the highest increase in registered doctors working in government hospitals. In 2016, roughly 9,000 new doctors were registered in the state.

The downside is that Penang saw a reduce by approximately 4,000 doctors working in government hospitals from 2014 to 2015. In 2016, Penang registered doctors who work for government hospitals only slightly recover by an additional of 1,000 doctors.

Additionally, there is also not much of an improvement for the amount of private doctors in Penang, only increase by roughly 1,000 doctors.

Nevertheless, Penang takes the lead in medical tourism when compared to the other states in Malaysia. It was announced by Lim Guan Eng back in April 2018 (when he was still the Chief Minister of Penang), Penang contributed 42.3% in the revenue of Malaysia medical tourism.