Speech by Dr Mohamad Maliki Osman, Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Health and Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports, at the SIM-University of Sydney Graduation Ceremony

23 Sep 2005

By Dr Mohamad Maliki Osman

1. First let me congratulate all graduates of SIM-UOS for successfully completing your degrees.  The SIM-University of Sydney partnership is a very successful collaboration between two well known institutions to provide continuing professional development for the healthcare professionals.  This partnership has provided an avenue for healthcare professionals to upgrade themselves without having to leave their job or their homeland.  The effects of such an education initiative have, I believe, led to better healthcare and enhanced the confidence of the healthcare profession.  I am much heartened to learn that today, another successful cohort of more than 200 healthcare professionals have upgraded themselves professionally in SIM-UOS.  I’m sure each and every one of you will play a greater role in contributing to the healthcare of Singapore.

2. Singapore will continue to need more healthcare professionals in the future to meet the needs of an aging population.  The life expectancy of our people has and will continue to rise.  We will see more services needed in our step down facilities like community hospitals, nursing homes and community day rehabilitation centres.  Apart from well trained nurses, more occupational and physiotherapists will be required to meet this rise in demand.

3. As such I see a great future ahead of you.  Opportunities are abundant for healthcare professionals who upgraded themselves.  In the clinical field, they can be upgraded to skilled practitioners in their specialty areas.  They can also develop their career as an educator - teaching and guiding their juniors in clinical settings or education institutions.  Alternatively, as managers or administrators, they manage a unit, a department or even a hospital by ensuring that there is adequate staffing and material resources. 

4. As a group, healthcare professionals are increasingly recognised as an important part of the economies of any nation.  While in the past healthcare was thought of as a mainly domestic service, today, it is a truly a globalised service. Healthcare is interlinked with the entire cluster of services that a modern and flourishing society must provide effectively and well.  We cannot attract tourists and an international community if we are unable to provide them with retail experience, international schools, efficient financial services and healthcare that can be trusted. 

5. Singapore aspires to be a regional medical hub to provide the best of healthcare services to attract a million patients by 2012.  In year 2003, Singapore attracted about 230,000 foreign patients. Many thousands of new jobs are expected to be created in the healthcare industry as well as in other associated services if we succeed in becoming a regional medical hub.  In this regard, I would like to urge all graduates that besides your clinical skills, the skills must be well delivered so that you have a perfect package.  

6. Supposing you buy a very expensive gift, you would certainly have it very beautifully wrapped in a highly presentable way.  So too, your skills which were obtained at great expense must not be marred by bad service delivery.  One may be very skilful, but if one’s service is delivered in an impolite and uncultured way, one’s skills may not be appreciated.  Thus the expensive gift was poorly wrapped and presented!  Put ourselves therefore in the shoes of our patients all the time and give them the best service that we can. Our politeness, patience, understanding and tolerance will go a long way; in the process, we can achieve better patient outcome and gain more personal satisfaction.  This is more so when your patients are foreign, give them a good impression of the hospitality of Singapore. After all, the word “hospital” comes from old Latin, hospitale or guest house. Treat all your patients like guests who need your tender and compassionate care.

7. Our Prime Minister Lee, in his recent National Day Rally Speech, singled out the service culture as one of the key mindset change Singaporeans must achieve in the remaking of Singapore.  He described service culture as “a critical success factor if we are going to develop a service industry…”  The health industry is serving a new generation of patients who challenge our skills and are able to make us better professionals by their higher demands.  The more sophisticated the society, the better the professionals because sophistication breed sophistication, higher education promotes higher skills. We must therefore not long for the old days when people accept lower standards for healthcare because in every sector of our economy, whether it be hotel, education, retail, financial, immigration, cleaning or healthcare, we ourselves now expect the highest service standards and value.

8. Health care is extremely high-touch and personal.  We need to be trained in gracious service and interpersonal skills to complement our clinical expertise.  This is the same in any service industry whether you are a waiter, air stewardess or counter staff. We need to be trained to handle patients of every kind with great dexterity and skill in rendering comfort and service satisfaction.  Your comforting and courteous touch will speed up healing; a happy patient’s sickness will definitely improve faster than an unhappy one.

9. Providing excellent service is not limited to your patients alone. As a service provider, you must also recognise that patients’ families and loved ones are equally important. Their involvement will facilitate the recovery process for the patients.  These family members often look up to health care professionals for information, guidance and often times reassurances.  Your packaged service must include these loved ones in mind.  This is especially so if we want to be a regional medical hub and attract more foreign patients.  These patients will come here with their family members and we must be prepared to make sure that their stay here is pleasant, meaningful and memorable – a significant KPI – they will return for the same comprehensive, packaged service.

10. Patients and their families are not your only “clientele” group.  In today’s setting, you must recognise that you also service other health care professionals.  You have to work with other health care professionals in an interdisciplinary framework. Collaboration is essential to ensure the progress of the whole healthcare industry.  Working as a team means that every team member needs to be responsive to satisfying the needs of their common client.  Effective teams have shared aims and usually operate an informal atmosphere, and engage in open discussion.  Your tertiary education will put you in good stead to embrace an interdisciplinary work environment.  It should enhance understanding between disciplines and promote a collaborative spirit between members of the team.  With the healthcare professionals moving together in synchrony, our healthcare industry will certainly scale greater heights.  

11. To this batch of graduates, I am most encouraged to learn that 90% of you enrolled for this programme on a self-paying basis.  I am cheered by your high degree of self-motivation, perseverance, dedication and passion in investing time, effort and money to complete the course.  I wish you every success in your careers and hope that you will also reach the pinnacles of service excellence while you excel in your chosen fields.  Once again, my congratulations to each and everyone of you on your graduation today.

12. Thank you.