Private hospitals, especially in Turkey’s larger cities, hire one another their redundant doctors, due to a regulation of the ministry implemented in Feb. 15, 2008 to decline the number of doctor transfers from public hospitals to private hospitals.

According to the regulation, private hospitals are not allowed to recruit new staff until a further regulation.

An additional staff authorization has not been revealed until today. In such situation, hospitals which are not able to meet their staff need, hire doctors from other hospitals that have redundant staff.

The "doctor staff market" meets a need, according to Reşat Bahat, head of the Private Hospitals and Healthcare Organizations Association, or OHSAD. “Buying doctors with money is seriously worrying. But being unable to find a doctor even with money would be much more worrying,” Bahat said. 

The regulation does not say “sell staff,” but “transfer one another,” Bahat said. “But an artificial value is created in the end. If you do not allow recruiting even a single doctor or qualified medical equipment, you can face with these kinds of results,” he added.

Increasing doctor demand boosts transfer prices in the staff market. Hiring costs are around 250,000 Turkish Liras for physiotherapists in the doctor market, while this figure may be 125,000 liras for dermatologists. The appraised value for a gynecologist is nearly 70,000 liras. The number of “staff on sale” announcements is increasing each day on some websites in which private hospitals are member.

‘Just like to taxi license plates’

On the other hand the ministry approves the formation of a staff market, due to the regulation. “The situation obviously turned into taxi license plate sales,” officials from the health said. According to officials the ministry has recently begun to examine the additional staff demands of hospitals, but still there is no concrete step taken to regulate the current situation.

The ministry brought this restriction to regulate the employment in public hospitals and allowed private hospitals to transfer doctors upon request of the sector, according to officials.

A great part of private hospitals work today with the same number of staff since three years. There is no legal restriction for private hospitals to transfer their doctor staff to another hospital or medical center being in the same city. But hospitals should receive authorization to transfer their doctors to another hospital located in a different city.

The upper limit in doctor transfers is 3 percent. A private hospital is allowed to incorporate new staff as much as the 3 percent of its total staff.