Why did I make this site?

I’m not a healthcare worker, but everyone around me is

I am not a doctor, and I am not a pharmacist. But many of my friends have a medical background, and plenty of them were top students. Some were JPA scholars.

Many of them studied overseas. Honestly, a lot of them never wanted to go abroad in the first place. Under Malaysia’s education system, going overseas was simply the more practical road. After graduating, many wanted to stay and work there, but local regulations, the state of the industry and the fact that their families were all in Malaysia brought them home in the end. The price of coming home was a much smaller income.

It starts with my cousin

My cousin said he wanted to be a doctor from the time he was small. In secondary school he joined St John Ambulance. On weekends, while others were out playing, he was learning to bandage wounds and give first aid.

He went to a Chinese independent school, and with his family’s finances the way they were, he chose to study medicine in Shanghai. A few years later he graduated and came home, and everyone thought he could finally be a doctor.

I still remember that day, more than twenty years ago. He stormed through the front door, his face full of anger, and the first thing he shouted was:

“Burn all my medical books!”

It turned out that medical graduates from China had to pass an exam back home before they could be recognised in Malaysia. He said he failed that time, while someone he knew who had connections passed.

Later he went back to Shanghai to study again, sat the exam a few years later and finally got his recognition. Today he runs his own clinic here.

It ended well. But I keep wondering: what if his family hadn’t been able to send him abroad a second time?

A top pharmacist with no clear road ahead

Life has taken me down a few turns, and my work now brings me into contact with all kinds of healthcare people.

Once I met Ah Wong, a pharmacist who graduated from Monash University. While studying pharmacy he won several scholarships. They covered all his fees and still left a surplus. Honestly, I have rarely heard of anyone finishing a pharmacy degree with money to spare.

But scholarships come at a price. As a JPA scholar, he had to leave home and serve at a government hospital on the outskirts.

One day, as we talked, he told me he felt lost about the future. There seemed to be only three roads in front of him:

1. Stay in the government hospital. But promotion depends on seniority more than performance. So what if you were a top Monash graduate? You still wait your turn in the system.
2. Do research in a company lab. A road he did not want.
3. Open a pharmacy, like many seniors do. And then fight an endless price war with the shop next door, the chain stores and online sellers.

Someone that capable, looking at the roads ahead, unable to find one that was truly his.

That is the quiet frustration of pharmacists in Malaysia.

A dietitian trained in the United States, who came home and had to bow her head

There is one more person, and her story still makes my eyes sting.

She was a top student too. She went to the United States to study to be a dietitian, and she even worked with a cancer society there. Then, because of her family’s situation, she had to come back to Malaysia.

Many people don’t know what a dietitian is and often treat her as an ordinary “nutrition consultant”. Overseas it is a respected professional role. Back in Malaysia the title carries little weight. There are few suitable jobs, and many companies simply don’t need one.

Money was tight at home and she couldn’t afford to wait, so she swallowed her pride, took a job selling medicine, and moved through several jobs while looking for something better.

Her latest job was at a company selling health products through social media resellers, teaching the resellers how to sell. One day her boss said to her:

“Look at you. So what if you studied in America? Some kind of ‘titien’ (he couldn’t even say dietitian), and you still end up working for me. I only finished secondary school.”

Life left her no choice but to smile.

When you live under someone else’s roof, you learn to bow your head.

Not everyone gets a second chance

My cousin made it through because his family could hold on. Ah Wong is still waiting his turn in the system. She is still smiling with her head bowed.

And there are many more who never even get the chance to say it out loud. Some families borrowed money for medical school and can’t afford to wait. Some wait so long for a houseman post that panic sets in. Some finish housemanship on a contract and don’t know whether there will still be a place for them in a few years. Some are on call until the early hours, check their bank account at the end of the month, and are left with one thought: “All those years of study, and this is it?”

The saddest part is not how hard they work. It is that their talent slowly wears away. Some quietly change careers, some go abroad and never come back, and some stay but grow a little quieter every year.

You don’t have to keep saying “I’m fine”

So many healthcare people are like this: about to go under, and still giving a thumbs-up and saying “I’m fine”.

At the hospital, at the counter, at home, you have held on long enough. That is why I made White Coat Unheard.

This is a place where you can put it all down. You can write your story and say what you really feel, without leaving your name, and no one will recognise you. Every story grows into a tree in this forest, so the people who come after you know they are not the only ones.

Your wish to save people and help people should not be slowly worn away by the system and your surroundings.