The UAE will be in need of a staggering 12,920 new doctors by 2014 owing to the unprecedented growth in the nation's healthcare sector, revealed a new study.

The emirates' insatiable thirst for new doctors is upbeat news on several levels: on a personal level, it gives patients a wider range of specialists who can attend to them, which leads for instance to shorter waiting lists, shorter waiting times and fewer transfers, according to the research conducted by RNCOS.

This unprecedented growth in medical vacancies reflects the growth of the nation’s health sector, which has defied expectations and continues to expand at a robust pace, it said.

The research was conducted by RNCOS and published in a study entitled “UAE Healthcare Sector Forecast to 2014”.

On an organizational level, it gives hospitals a wider pool of expertise to draw from, making them more multi-skilled. On a national level, it proves that the economy is enjoying vigorously healthy growth, the study added.

To bridge this mammoth gap between demand and supply, Saudi German Hospital-Dubai (SGH-Dubai) said it has already started luring some of the world’s sharpest medical brains to the country.

This news has far-reaching implications for the health sector: for example it has sparked increased competition for top doctors, giving premier hospitals like SGH-Dubai a stronger pulling power, due to the superior standards and technology.

The revelation that the UAE needs thousands of doctors within a very narrow timeframe has been attributed to several factors.

The biggest reason cited is that the UAE is currently lagging behind the US and some European countries - not in the quality of healthcare per se, but rather in the ratio of doctors per thousand people. This has therefore sparked an aggressive recruitment drive to surge ahead of such countries.

'However, leading hospitals like Saudi German Hospital-Dubai already enjoy more favorable doctor-patient ratios than their American and European counterparts,' remarked Dr Mohaymen Abdelghany, the CEO of Saudi German Hospital-Dubai.

This is not just a quantitative recruitment but also qualitative, he pointed out.

'Despite the UAE’s steep demand for new doctors, we have not compromised the calibre or quality of specialists we have employed. Our criteria regarding qualifications and experience is stringent, and was specifically crafted to ensure we hired only the best of the best,' he added.-TradeArabia News Service