Daily Times

Sir: The Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) is a government-controlled organisation responsible for the registration of all doctors practising in Pakistan. This is mandatory.

All medical graduates also have a legal right to obtain this registration certificate. My daughter had graduated from Aga Khan University in 2008.

A provisional registration certificate B 56476-S was issued as per rules of the PMDC. She completed her mandatory internship training at a hospital in the University of Illinois, Chicago, and applied for full registration to the PMDC, Islamabad. Her completed application, along with a demand draft for $ 60, was received by the PMDC on February 24, 2014, at 9: 30 am. The money has been credited to the account of the PMDC.

Her application documents were sent via the Foreign Office, Islamabad, to the University of Illinois for verification. These were verified by the university and returned to the Pakistan embassy in Washington.

It is now more than eight months and there is no trace of the registration certificate. When we contacted the PMDC, we were informed that the Foreign Office had not returned the documents and further processing of the application would be done as soon as these documents were received.

How and when this will happen is anybody’s guess since there are serious administrative hiccups in the affairs of the PMDC, Islamabad. The registration certificate is an essential document, and a doctor has a right to obtain it.

I appeal to the president, PMDC, and minister of state, national health services regulation and coordination, Saira Afzal Tarar, to instruct the relevant office of the PMDC to issue this long overdue document.

Dr Khalid Zafar Hashmi

Karachi