KUALA LUMPUR: When Dr Nurul (not her real name) was a houseman at a government hospital in Selangor a few years agolodi777, being yelled at by some of her superiors in front of patients was the norm.
They told her she had “no brains” and had wasted her money and time studying medicine, recalled Dr Nurul, who is in her 30s.
Faced with such co-workers with a “god complex”, Dr Nurul said she contemplated quitting several times.
“But I knew I couldn’t because that meant they would win. The only thing you could do was to suck it up,” she said, adding that being berated in front of patients occurred daily during some of her postings.
“I had several friends who were in the same boat and we could speak and cry out to one another about our situation. That helped me get through the difficult times,” the civil servant told CNA on condition of anonymity as she is not authorised to speak to the media.
While bullies form a minority, they cause a lot of damage overall, she added.
A recent suicide by a doctor in Sabah has once again highlighted the problem of workplace bullying in Malaysia’s public healthcare sector, prompting renewed calls to address the long-standing issue.
On Aug 29, Dr Tay Tien Yaa, 30, who headed the Chemical Pathology Unit at Hospital Lahad Datu, was found dead in her rental home. According to family members, she had started working at the hospital in February and a senior colleague had allegedly “mistreated, oppressed” her.
The police do not suspect foul play, and Health Minister Dzulkefly Ahmad reiterated a zero-tolerance approach to bullying while calling for a thorough probe into Dr Tay's death.
“All Health Ministry staff deserve a safe and just working environment,” he said in a series of tweets on Sep 16, after a Facebook post two days earlier by Dr Tay’s brother.
“I understand this toxic work culture still persists, so perpetrators just stop it!”
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Malaysia’s health minister wants thorough probe into doctor’s death, after family claimed workplace bullying led to her suicide 
A shortage of surgeons in Malaysia's public hospitals may further impact patients' quality of care, say experts WORKPLACE BULLYING MORE SEVERE IN HEALTHCARE?Experts say workplace bullying is a universal problem not confined to healthcare.
Although past studies do not show a higher prevalence of bullying in healthcare than other sectors, the experts believe it may be more pronounced or severe in healthcare due to a high-pressure environment where patients’ lives are at stake.
Factors such as heavy workloads compounded by manpower issues and the lack of support systems contribute to endemic bullying, they believe.
The number of housemen at the Ministry of Health fell by about half between 2019 and 2023, from 6,134 to 3,271, according to official data reported by news outlet The Star earlier this year.
The lack of cardiothoracic surgeons – 14 in the seven public hospitals where heart surgery is performed in Malaysia – was also highlighted in July, when four graduates of a “parallel pathway” training programme with the Royal College of Surgeons Edinburgh in cardiothoracic surgery applied for a joint judicial review to contest the Malaysian Medical Council's decision to deny their applications for the National Specialist Register, a database of specialist medical practitioners in the country.
In the earlier news reports, experts flagged the need to tackle the shortage of doctors and warned of the potential impact on patient care.
Dr Tay’s death occurred about two years after a houseman at the Penang General Hospital reportedly committed suicide after experiencing workplace bullying.
Back then, the government formed a Healthcare Work Culture Improvement Task Force (HWCITF) to investigate the death of the 25-year-old, as well as claims of a bullying culture prevalent within its health departments.
It listed intimidation, isolation, vilification, misgendering, inflammatory language, harassment, unfair compensation, unfair working hours and unfair workload as types of bullying.
In its report that was released in August 2022, the taskforce found no strong evidence of workplace bullying in relation to the houseman’s death. But it noted that burnout, bullying and an unhealthy work culture were present in the Health Ministry at different levels, albeit not in all healthcare facilities.
The report also surveyed more than 110,000 workers in the Ministry of Health. About 30 per cent admitted to burnout while 7.5 per cent felt they had been bullied at work.
About a quarter of more than 20,000 respondents at the management or supervisory level admitted to acts of bullying at their workplace.
Of those who admitted to bullying, about 20 per cent said they engaged in “severe” bullying while the others said they were involved in “low”-level bullying.
The report, which stated that the Ministry of Health had about 250,000 staff, also emphasised a significant shortage of doctors, nurses and other healthcare staff, especially in rural areas, who face excessive workloads leading to stress and burnout.
In a separate survey last year of 728 doctors, the Malaysian Medical Association (MMA) found that 30 to 40 per cent of doctors in the country have experienced some form of bullying.
The survey also found that victims are more likely not to file a complaint out of fear, or are unsure how to go about it.
In comparison, a 2019 study found almost 40 per cent of Malaysian employees had experienced workplace bullying.
The study, titled “Workplace bullying and psychological distress of employees across socioeconomic strata: a cross-sectional study”, surveyed more than 5,200 people from 47 organisations in Malaysia and was published in the BMC Public Health journal.
It is said to be the first to report the prevalence of workplace bullying and its association with socioeconomic factors and psychological distress in a large sample of Malaysian employees recruited from multiple organisations.
The study did not identify the organisations or industries they belonged tolodi777, but found those who had been bullied at work to be specifically associated with being female, drawing a higher income, and with greater psychological distress.
Reforms are needed in Malaysia's healthcare system, experts say. (Photo: iStock/ ThamKC)