IDI Acknowledges Existence of ‘Culture’ of Bullying in PPDS

JAKARTA – The Indonesian Doctors Association (IDI) admits that bullying often occurs in the medical world. In fact, it has become a ‘culture’.

Coordinator of Junior Doctor Network (JDN) IDI, dr. Tommy Dharmawan said, the pattern of bullying in the Specialist Doctor Education Program (PPDS) in Indonesia has been going on for a long time. One of them is the pattern of seniority that is not good and most often occurs in PPDS in Indonesia.

“The pattern of bullying has been going on for a very long time. This kind of cultural pattern exists, we do not deny it,” said Dr. Tommy in an online press conference, Wednesday (8/21/2024).

Doctor Tommy hopes that the seniority pattern in PPDS will be abolished. He gave an example, there are a number of doctors who cannot practice in an area because it is already controlled by their seniors.

“There are some bad seniority cultures. There are PPDS who are not allowed to practice in a region because there are already seniors, so (junior doctors) PPDS are afraid,” he said.

“Seniority exists. Juniors learn from seniors, there is a bullying system that must be broken,” he continued.

In addition, Dr. Tommy also highlighted PPDS who were not paid, and according to him, this was a problem in Indonesia.

Salary has a big influence on bullying cases, so that some senior doctors ask to be fed, driven, and even asked to be given services outside of academics.

“If PPDS are given a salary, at least they can buy their own food. Or when their child is sick, imagine PPDS participants aged 27 to 35 years, they should have a salary at that age and have a family. Imagine if their child is sick, their family is sick, there is no salary at all. How have they been supporting themselves all this time,” said Dr. Tommy.