Health Minister Julius Timothy has defended the employment of four Chinese doctors to the main hospital here even as he acknowledged that the medical board has not registered three of the medical practitioners.

Concerns have been raised here that the doctors may not be able to communicate properly with the patients because of the language barrier. “We have no difficulty at all.

The medical board registered one doctor initially because they were satisfied with the language communication,” he said, insisting “It is not a matter of qualification the doctors are all highly qualified and suitable for the jobs.

The problem was in terms of communication whether they could communicate with patients in a way not to raise too much anxiety. As a result the medical board registered one and we have three more doctors working with the hospital, they are not working alone”.

“They are not registered by the medical board, we are treating them like interns, they are not working alone and they are working with the existing specialists to ensure that the proper service is given”.

Timothy said that the authorities are ‘not satisfied that the language competence is adequate enough to deal with patients so that they will deal with patients but through our registered local doctors.

It is not causing any difficulty at the moment, we all understood and ....we are observing for the next three months and once we are satisfied that their language competence is up to level they will be fully registered and able to work on their own.

“If not we will cross the bridge when we get there,” Timothy said, adding we are pretty sure that what we have seen they will be up to standard”. Dominica has benefited significantly from its relationship with China after the Roosevelt Skerrit administration ended its relationship with Taiwan in favour of Beijing eight years ago.