ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) is facing confusion if it can verify 45 degrees/certincates submitted by candidates for the top seats of three medical universities in Punjab after reports that some of the applicants had obtained `bogus` online degrees.

PMDC member Dr Amir Bandesha said the Punjab health department had been asked to provide the names of candidates along with their degrees so that the council would verify them.

He said the provincial health authorities had only sent the degrees to the PMDC. But Pims Vice Chancellor Dr Javed Akram said it was not a rocket science toverify a degree.

He said 99.9pc degrees can be verified through the web, adding a number of credible websites also provided their services for the verification of degrees.

At present a process is underway to hirevice chancellors for the University of Health Sciences, King Edward Medical University and the Fatima Jinnah Medical University.

The Punjab health department approached the PMDC for the verification and evaluation of45nationalandinternational degrees of the candidates.

An official of the Ministry of National Health Services, requesting not to be quoted, said as per rules before any foreign qualification is recognised and registered the PMDC had to satisf y itself about the legitimacy and professional status of the training institute in the respective country which issued the degree.

`The council can even visit the degreeawarding foreign institution. It has to evaluate its curriculum and training facilities and can also get confirmation through diplomatic channels. However, many of these steps were not followed by the PMDC before the registration of foreign qualifications in the past.

He said it was unfortunate that the number of people with dubious degrees had not only flourished but they were also eying lucrative posts of VCs.

In the United States, the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) is an independent, not-forprofit, physician-led organisation that sets and monitors the professional educational standards essential in preparing physi-cians, he said.

`Moreover, in the US the Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates (ECFMG) is responsible for assessing the readiness of international medical graduates to enter residency or fellowship programmes in the US. The ECFMG conducts three exams and after fulfilling the essential requirement a candidate becomes eligible to enter the US for further residency training,` he said.

In contrast, degrees are also obtained through paying a few hundred dollars online.

Therefore, it is obvious that for any foreign US degree to be registered with the PMDC there must be evidence that the holder passed the United States Medical Licensing Examination after travelling to that country to obtain physical training there, he said.

Dr Akram said to become a VC the candidate should have level-four qualifications which meant after post-graduation they should have done FCPS, MD, MS, PhD, the fellowship of the American or the Royal colleges, etc.

`Moreover, a candidate should have published 28 research papers in `impact factor` journals. It means those journals which create an impact. I am the VC of Pims and can publish as many research papers in Pims Journal as I want but it will not be considered as an impact journal.There are websites which provide services to find the impact factor of research papers,` he said.

He said rather than evaluating degrees of all the candidates, the degrees of only three short-listed ones should be evaluated or verified.

In reply to a question, Dr Akram said being an adviser to the Royal College of Physicians (London), he suggested that the research work of the candidates should be considered for the appointment because the job of a university was to create knowledge.

Dr Bandesha said it was a very complicated issue and there were chances that bogus courses were recognised by PMDC in the past.

`However, we don`t want to open a Pandora`s Box. We have sought the names of the candidates along with their degrees.

If anyone has any complaint against the candidates, they should directly lodge a complaint against them,` he said.

`The verification of local degrees is not a problem but that of the foreign degrees is an issue. We have also suggested to the Punjab health authorities that they can verify the degrees from our website,` he said.

About the online degrees, Dr Bandesha said the council had asked for the submission of entry and exit dates on the passportofthe candidates.