Trainee doctors aren't coming back yet

On February 6, last year, the government increased the number of medical school seats nationwide from 3,058 to 5,058. It was the first increase in 27 years since 1998. At the time, Health and Welfare Minster Cho Kyu-hong said, “We decided to increase the number of medical school students based on the supply and demand forecast that there will be a shortage of 15,000 doctors by 2035, given the growing medical needs due to the rapid aging of the population.” Resisting the policy to expand medical school students, doctors, and medical students left their training hospitals and schools.

What are doctors and medical students doing now? A majority of them found employment at hospitals other than their training hospitals. Medical students who submitted a leave of absence are working part-time or catching up on their studies. Some have retaken the scholastic aptitude test to change schools, and others have traveled abroad. The medical student organization has said students will be collectively submitting leaves of absence again this year, and there is even speculation in the medical community that the incoming class of March will effectively take a collective leave of absence.

Was there no chance for them to return? Doctors were agitated when the government announced the enrollment quotas for various medical colleges for the 2025 academic year on March 20 last year. Once the increase was finalized, mainly at medical schools in provincial regions, they judged that the quotas could not be reversed. However, the trainee doctors' organization started blocking them from returning. They were also shaken when the government said it would not punish trainee doctors who left hospitals. However, the professors at the medical school misunderstood the government's policy as a punishment for trainee doctors and decided to temporarily suspend medical service to form a united front with their students. When the government reversed course and accepted all doctors as having officially resigned, it also caused agitation among trainee doctors. Again, the trainee doctors organization launched an internal crackdown.

They were most shaken last December when training hospitals recruited new residents for the first half of this year. Residents who had given up training for nearly a year were well aware that they were wasting valuable time and had a profound psychological conflict. Many of the residents at large hospitals seriously considered applying for residency. However, President Yoon Suk Yeol’s declaration of emergency martial law, followed by the National Assembly’s motion to impeach him, put an end to this movement. Thus, few trainee doctors have applied for residencies that are set to resume training this March.

Then, should the government give up and simply let the situation continue? The government needs to devise a concrete alternative measure to convince doctors as doctors’ organizations have demanded that the government " devise a plan for medical education.” It should provide not only the necessary budget for faculty and facilities but also a concrete plan on how to secure them and when. The government needs to be flexible in its negotiations, as it has vowed to reconsider next year's medical school enrollment from scratch, including a possible reduction of the number. The medical community should also stop making unrealistic demands like “zero medical students in the 2026 school year” and instead suggest a reasonable plan. Polls show that most of the public still believes there is a shortage of doctors.

Ultimately, it is none other than patients and the public that take the brunt of the damage caused by medical gaps. Last year, the government injected 2.895 trillion won into the national health insurance budget to address medical service gaps and make advance payments to training hospitals. We can only hope that the grave situation of trainee doctors’ quitting their positions and medical students collectively taking leave of absence will not occur for two consecutive years. It is about time that the government and the medical community met with each other and started communicating.