Guam's medical community talks about bringing talent back home
By Janjeera Hail
Published Jul 23, 2009
KUAM News
Local doctors and island leaders are concerned over about the state of healthcare in the territory and are coming together to find solutions. This morning, local doctors and medical professionals hosted a very special meeting - a discussion with medical professionals from Guam on how the island can stop the brain drain and bring local talent home.
Joining the conference via telephone were off-island physicians and medical students who discussed their perspective on why doctors from Guam choose to stay in the States after receiving training. Local physician Dr. Patrick Santos said, "The cost of medical education is astronomical - it's just too much and you owe money because you have student loan, and of course, there's bureaucracy on Guam. He added, "if you sub-specialize, Guam may not have that clientele patients, or Guam may not have that facility. So there's a lot of factors involved."
With the impending military buildup, Guam will require a greater number of medical professionals to serve a growing population. And that also means a greater number of opportunities. Now, more than ever, medical students from Guam have the opportunity to return home to a strong economic environment even while the rest of the nation struggles.
Medical student Christian Eusebio told KUAM News, "There's first-year residents in the States I've talked to; they want to come back so if we can continue to have this communication and improve the healthcare on Guam, that'd be great," he said.
In the meantime, Senator Eddie Calvo says that there are steps that policymakers and the local community can take towards enticing medical professionals to share their talents on Guam. "They mentioned certain laws that were enacted in the past that need to be worked on, so that's where we can move on there are also some of these areas in the administrative level and administration of certain things such as the Pro-Tech Scholarship, those things don't need to be worked on legislatively, but we have to look at the process and try to improve on it," he said.
Although the island will continue to face hurdles in drawing home medical professionals, today's forum illustrates the island's commitment to bringing our doctors home.
Showing posts with label Brain Drain. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brain Drain. Show all posts
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Brain Drain in the NMI
NMI faces brain drain
Local
Sunday, March 30, 2008
By Agnes E. Donato, Reporter
NMI workers may flock to Guam for buildup
If the CNMI economy continues at its sluggish pace, the Commonwealth may very well lose some of its best and brightest workers to neighboring Guam, which economy is expected to benefit from the relocation of 8,000 U.S. Marines and 9,000 of their dependents from Okinawa.
This according to First Hawaiian Back economic consultant Dr. Leroy Laney, who served as guest speaker during Friday's Saipan Chamber of Commerce monthly meeting at the Saipan Grand Hotel.
Responding to a question posed by Northern Marianas College's Eric Plinske about the negative impact, if any, the Guam military buildup would have in the CNMI, Laney said workers leaving would be biggest problem.
“If there is no or very little job creation here and it all goes over there [Guam]-that's where all the job creation is, depending on how long it lasts,” he said.
In an interview with the Saipan Tribunei after his presentation, the professor of Economic and Finance at the Hawaii Pacific University reiterated that line of thought.
“Maybe Guam is where people will go for jobs because there will be a lot of jobs over there. There will be a brain drain and a body drain,” he said.
“I think there's more to do in Guam to employ people in the CNMI and immigrant workers in the Philippines and other countries. One of their big problems is not having enough labor and since the CNMI is right next door, it would seem to me that it's only logical that would be a possible source of it.”
Laney, however, said that the migration of CNMI workers to the northernmost part of the Mariana chain would likely be temporary. “The possibility is they would all come back after it's over; the [military buildup] won't last forever.”
He added, “It's sort of like a hardening of the infrastructure and all this military housing, but it will not create permanent jobs. So it depends on how long it will be but certainly people do go where job opportunities are and jobs is one way to measure an economy.”
Laney, who used to work under former Federal Reserve chair Allan Greenspan, also said that the military's timeframe for the Guam military buildup (2010-2014) seems a little optimistic.
“Looks like it might be unrealistic and it’s going to be hard to meet that timeframe but it is going to be positive for the Guam economy. When you talk about an order of magnitude like this it’s really very hard to put any kind of precise estimate on real gross island product rates of growth,” he said.
Laney added that he talked with people in the construction industry in Guam and they said if 2010 is the target date for the start of the military buildup in Guam, then the groundwork plan should have already been laid out by now.
Local
Sunday, March 30, 2008
By Agnes E. Donato, Reporter
NMI workers may flock to Guam for buildup
If the CNMI economy continues at its sluggish pace, the Commonwealth may very well lose some of its best and brightest workers to neighboring Guam, which economy is expected to benefit from the relocation of 8,000 U.S. Marines and 9,000 of their dependents from Okinawa.
This according to First Hawaiian Back economic consultant Dr. Leroy Laney, who served as guest speaker during Friday's Saipan Chamber of Commerce monthly meeting at the Saipan Grand Hotel.
Responding to a question posed by Northern Marianas College's Eric Plinske about the negative impact, if any, the Guam military buildup would have in the CNMI, Laney said workers leaving would be biggest problem.
“If there is no or very little job creation here and it all goes over there [Guam]-that's where all the job creation is, depending on how long it lasts,” he said.
In an interview with the Saipan Tribunei after his presentation, the professor of Economic and Finance at the Hawaii Pacific University reiterated that line of thought.
“Maybe Guam is where people will go for jobs because there will be a lot of jobs over there. There will be a brain drain and a body drain,” he said.
“I think there's more to do in Guam to employ people in the CNMI and immigrant workers in the Philippines and other countries. One of their big problems is not having enough labor and since the CNMI is right next door, it would seem to me that it's only logical that would be a possible source of it.”
Laney, however, said that the migration of CNMI workers to the northernmost part of the Mariana chain would likely be temporary. “The possibility is they would all come back after it's over; the [military buildup] won't last forever.”
He added, “It's sort of like a hardening of the infrastructure and all this military housing, but it will not create permanent jobs. So it depends on how long it will be but certainly people do go where job opportunities are and jobs is one way to measure an economy.”
Laney, who used to work under former Federal Reserve chair Allan Greenspan, also said that the military's timeframe for the Guam military buildup (2010-2014) seems a little optimistic.
“Looks like it might be unrealistic and it’s going to be hard to meet that timeframe but it is going to be positive for the Guam economy. When you talk about an order of magnitude like this it’s really very hard to put any kind of precise estimate on real gross island product rates of growth,” he said.
Laney added that he talked with people in the construction industry in Guam and they said if 2010 is the target date for the start of the military buildup in Guam, then the groundwork plan should have already been laid out by now.
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