Junior doctors likely to be dismissed en masse as resignation deadline passes

Over 12,000 junior doctors are expected to be dismissed from their training hospitals as the deadline for registering resignations passes, despite the government’s best efforts to entice them to return to the medical front line.

A medical professional walks by a sign for a pediatric emergency room in a general hospital in Seoul on Wednesday. [YONHAP]

Over 12,000 junior doctors are expected to be dismissed from their training hospitals as the deadline for registering resignations passes, despite the government’s best efforts to entice them to return to the medical front line.

A total of 44 junior doctors had returned to 211 training hospitals nationwide between last Friday and Monday — the day training hospitals were supposed to complete processing their resignations. Of 13,756 junior doctors nationwide, only 1,155 were working on Monday, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said.

According to the Health Ministry on Wednesday, around 38.1 percent of junior doctors in their second to fourth years of training in the country's five largest tertiary hospitals officially resigned from their duties. The number is likely to grow when the hospitals process pending resignations.

The exact number of resigned junior doctors is likely to be confirmed on Thursday because the hospitals must submit the number of vacant slots to the ministry by Wednesday. Starting next Monday, training hospitals will begin fall semester recruitment.

On Tuesday, Health Minister Cho Kyoo-hong said he expected that resigned junior doctors would outnumber the returnees. The minister added that the government would “announce tangible policies that could help draw junior doctors’ attention and persuade them” after checking the results of resignation processing this week.

The training hospitals — caught between the Scylla and Charybdis of dismissing junior doctors or losing quotas for fall semester employment — are taking measures at their end.

“The junior doctors’ recruitment quota at each hospital is fixed, which makes hospitals unable to hire more when resignations are not processed,” an anonymous official from a training hospital told Yonhap News Agency. Upon processing, positions occupied by walked-off junior doctors will become available job slots.

On Tuesday, Seoul National University Hospital (SNUH) sent a settlement notice about resignations to junior doctors who had not yet stated their stance on employment. The notice specified the effective date of their resignations and legal liabilities.

In the notice, SNUH clarified that the date of resignation processing would be July 15, and their resignations have been effective since Feb. 29. It also ordered them to settle and return the already-paid salaries — which they received during their walkout — by Aug. 31.

According to Yonhap News Agency’s report on Wednesday, barely any junior doctors have responded to the notice.

The education and training department at Catholic Medical Center, affiliated with the Catholic University of Korea, also informed their junior doctors that resignations will be automatically processed if they do not clarify their stances on employment by midnight Tuesday.

In South Chungcheong, the emergency room at Soon Chun Hyang University Hospital Cheonan was closed on Tuesday after four doctors specializing in emergency medicine resigned. The hospital will downsize the emergency room's services by halting operations between 8 p.m. and 8 a.m. from Wednesday to Sunday.

According to Yonhap News Agency, the four resigned doctors were displeased with overwork and the hospital’s choice to recruit a professor amid the junior doctors’ walkout.

The emergency room at Soon Chun Hyang University Hospital Cheonan is planning to normalize its services next Monday.

BY LEE SOO-JUNG [lee.soojung1@joongang.co.kr]