Views of SLT Graduates who later Studied Medical Lab Science about Program
By Dr. Kemzi Elechi-Amadi
In the past few weeks, there has been a confusion emanating from the spurious publication from practitioners of SLT in which they stated that the ruling of the Federal High Court, Calabar Division, has empowered them to practise “Science Laboratory Technology (CLINICAL)” (sic). This, to me, is the highest point of confusion and delusion.
This document highlights the views of MLS who had earlier studied SLT and were given the same idea that they would practise MLS, only to realize that they were falsely lured into a completely different path.
It is important that Nigerians should read the views of those who have passed through that road and learn from their experience, especially because the ordinary man on the street will be affected by the deception and impersonation of Medical Laboratory Scientists by SLT practitioners.
It is also important that parents and guardians be guided when choosing a course of study for their children/wards especially when faced with the decision to choose between MLS and SLT; they should know what they are going in for.
Finally, this is also a call to those in government and private health agencies to be guided in their policy direction as regarding the health/diagnostic laboratory human resource in their respective facilities.
The submissions of SLT practitioners who later studied MLS
- a. Name (not real name): I am Dr U. M. A.
b. SLT qualification: ND, and HND (SLT Microbiology/Parasitology/Virology)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: I later went and did AIMLS, FMLSCN, BSc, MSc, PhD. The reason I went back to read MLS is because I wanted to work in a hospital laboratory, but I could not get employment to work in a hospital lab with SLT. So, I had to go back and read MLS.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: I will advise those with SLT to go back and study MLS to enable them work in hospital laboratories if one is interested. Thanks.
2 a. Name (not real name): Joseph.
b. SLT qualification: HND (SLT Microbiology)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: To become certified due to constant embarrassment by MLSCN and State Ministry of Health. I was practising as a “quack” with my HND certificate.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: If interested in the medical services, they are to go back and study MLS so as to get licensed to practice. Knowledge of how to work on human samples are actually deficient in the SLT program.
3 a. Name (not real name): D. Onengiye
b. SLT qualification: HND (SLT Physiology/Pharmacology)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: After understanding the fact that there is a difference between SLT and MLS , in respect to what I was taught in the class , I decided to go further to study MLS.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: My advice to SLT guys is to have a direction in life and not be deceived that you are to work on the lab after your HND. We all in SLT have the desire to work in the medical laboratory, and studying SLT will not lead you there.
4 a. Name (not real name): Dr. Sereks
b. SLT qualification: OND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: I crossed over to MLS because SLT is not MEDICAL as the training during my OND had no MEDICAL COMPONENT.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: Do the needful by applying for Direct Entry Admission to MLS if they desire to practise LABORATORY DUTIES in a CLINICAL/MEDICAL LABORATORY.
5 a. Name (not real name): Lucky O. E.
b. SLT qualification: OND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: By training, the course curriculum is not clinically or medically inclined.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: Study MLS at the University level. MLSCN should seize the licence of those colleagues training SLT
6 a. Name (not real name): Awoibi, K.
b. SLT qualification: HND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: To work in the health sector, and be more progressive.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: If you want to practise as MLS, go back to School study MLS, or Concentrate on Water, Food and Industrial Area, Schools (Laboratories that you fall into ( Microbiology, Chemical/ Biochemistry ). I am on the SLT Students platform and I always debunk the claims of their lecturers/students.
7 a. Name (not real name): Bethel N.
b. SLT qualification: HND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: Because right from time it was in mind to be medical personnel, but studying SLT up to HND (Biochemistry/Microbiology option in SLT then) didn’t give me what it takes to be a medical worker, until I went for MLS.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: My advice is simple and pure, for them to go back to university to study MLS if anyone is interested to practise as medical personnel, just like I did.
8 a. Name (not real name): Maxwell L.S.
b. SLT qualification: OND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: Why I studied MLS was that SLT courses have no bearing with the analysis of body fluids for human health diagnostics and health. SLT is a pure and applied science. It doesn’t have any colouration with medical sciences as the lecturers are from biological science, physics, chemistry, photography, glass blowing and citizenship educational lecturers.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: My advice to SLT guys who are trying to practise MLS without BMLS and MLSCN licence is to enrol for a medical Laboratory Science program and obtain their BMLS degree and licence to practise as MLS.
9 a. Name (not real name): Doris C.N
b. SLT qualification: OND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: Science Laboratory cannot be equivalent to medical laboratory practices. The course syllabuses are never the same. I feel bad when the NISLT Council is deceiving their members.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: They should write JAMB like I did if they want to be a Medical practitioner in the field of laboratory medicine or I pray they get caught with their laboratory quackery and see how their so called council will abandoned them to riot in jail.
10 a. Name (not real name): Ibrahim O. M.
b. SLT qualification: OND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: My dream and objective of studying SLT then was to become a medical student or professional but I realised that during my training as SLT in school that SLT majorly industrial Laboratory with little or no background of medical laboratory practice; even the practical done in school were purely biological science, electronics/ physics and industrial chemistry. So, when I went for my SIWES as well as IT in a Hospital laboratory, I got to see the clear difference between MLS and SLT, because what was done in my SIWES and IT were not in line with my class school training in SL. This made me make more inquiry of what was required to become a Medical Laboratory Scientist, and I went for it.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: They should open their mind and think of what they were taught in school (both practical and classes) then compare it with what is done in the medical laboratory. Definitely, there is no shortcut than to go further for BMLS if they wish to practise as Medical Laboratory Scientist or rather focus on industrial Laboratory.
11 a. Name (not real name): Laura O
b. SLT qualification: HND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: It was after I got a proper orientation about SLT that I had to go and study BMLS.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: My advice for those in SLT that want to practise as MLS should go back and study BMLS as a course to get licensed to practice.
12 a. Name (not real name): Anonymous
b. SLT qualification: HND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: When I came to look for a job with my HND in microbiology/Virology, I was advised by the Gombe State government then to go to NVRI Vom and obtain the Associate in Medical Laboratory Science (AIMLS) and I quickly applied. That is how I found myself in Medical Laboratory Science.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: My advice to SLT graduate as I always do advice those who come to our facility for practical or IT is to go and study BMLS if they really want to work in the hospital or medical laboratories or they embrace and love that which they studied and work where their knowledge is relevant and will be appreciated than forcing themselves into a profession or place they know NOTHING about. Thank you
13 a. Name (not real name): John C.
b. SLT qualification: OND (SLT)
c. Reason for studying MLS later: It was due to the experience I had when I was to go for a year IT after my OND. I applied to a medical laboratory in Port Harcourt. To cut it short, the Scientist on duty then rejected me and advised me to seek a degree in MLS if I want to serve in a medical laboratory. I took the challenge and applied for direct entry and was taken.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: Because of my experience that year, I always advise many that come to my facility to seek for a degree in MLS and get certified to practice.
14 a. Name (not real name): Anonymous
b. SLT qualification: HND
c. Reason for studying MLS later: I realised that With SLT I can’t practise in a health set up and diagnostic Laboratory.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: If they are not ready to go back to school and do BMLS, they can run any other laboratory practice e.g water analysis and can also work in an industrial lab.
15 a. Name (not real name): Aliche C.
b. SLT qualification: BTech
c. Reason for studying MLS later: I came to study MLS after my SLT degree because I realised that Everything about SLT in Nigeria isn’t defined, example, job description after school.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: My colleagues in SLT who want to practise MLS should go and obtain BMLS just the way I did after 5 years of BTech (SLT).
16 a. Name (not real name): Ayodele A.
b. SLT qualification: OND
c. Reason for studying MLS later: I found myself in a medical laboratory for SIWES. Then, I fell in love immediately with medical laboratory practice, but my boss restricted me to only wash up and sample collection. Knowing my capacity I told myself this is where I belong. Immediately after I finished the Diploma in SLT I processed admission into Medical Laboratory Science.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: They should rather go back to school. Many SLT graduates today are in MLS practice after meeting the requirements.
17 a. Name (not real name): Wisdom O.
b. SLT qualification: HND
c. Reason for studying MLS later: The SLT programme is entirely different from the Medical Laboratory Science. During my SLT programme all our courses were not medically inclined. We only studied environmental, industrial, chemical and biological science. From my experience in both professions, SLT is not a medically related course. They can analyse samples from water, food, soil, etc, but not human samples. MLS works on human samples, while SLT is not permitted by law to do so.
SLT lecturers and NISLT are not being sincere to SLT graduates; they made them understand that SLT and MLS are the same but this is not true.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: My SLT colleagues should confine themselves to the area of practice as enshrined in the NISLT Act. Alternatively they should get a licensed MLS to cover their labs as required by law or better go back to university and study BMLS. They should not be dragging space with MLS.
18 a. Name (not real name): Anonymous
b. SLT qualification: HND
c. Reason for studying MLS later: Because I wanted to practise as a medical laboratory scientist through having the appropriate background of MLS. BMLS is very different from SLT and there is no base for comparison
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: Go back and study MLS. Period.
19 a. Name (not real name): Anonymous
b. SLT qualification: HND
c. Reason for studying MLS later: because then I really wanted work in hospital
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: They should never think of that if they really want practise medical profession they should go to a medical school not science school
20 a. Name (not real name): Magaji T.
b. SLT qualification: BTech
c. Reason for studying MLS later: Since Secondary School I wanted to study Medical Laboratory science. I was initially deceived and told that I can practise in the Medical Laboratory if I study Science Laboratory technology. It was later when I finished my study and went to AKTH for my SIWES I then got Orientation and fully informed on how to switch from SLT to MLS.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: They should abscond from practising MLS. If they really want to practise MLS they should further go and study medical lab science and be licensed in order to practise MLS.
21 a. Name (not real name): Adam A.
b. SLT qualification: OND
c. Reason for studying MLS later: To avoid practising quackery.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: They should go and read medical lab science, because they do not know the basics of medical lab which are: medical physiology, anatomy and medical biochemistry, etc. SLT is just an ordinary science; its discipline is far away from medical, how can someone practise something that he doesn’t know and claim the right except in Nigeria?
22 a. Name (not real name): Lesley O.
b. SLT qualification: OND
c. Reason for studying MLS later: I cannot work in the hospital Advise to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: They should not do it without a licensed MLS
23 a. Name (not real name): Anonymous
b. SLT qualification: BSLT
c. Reason for studying MLS later: To be a professional and licensed to practise Medical Laboratory Science
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: Get the requisite training in MLS (BMLS) and get Licensed by MLSCN to practise as Medical Laboratory Scientist.
24
a. Name (not real name): Yomi
b. SLT qualification: HND
c. Reason for studying MLS later: Because I have passion for the profession and I love to save lives.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: They should improve themselves further if they love the profession.
25
a. Name (not real name): Anonymous
b. SLT qualification: HND
c. Reason for studying MLS later: A childhood interest to work in human and animal Laboratory.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: Get professional course that can allow them to practise as medical laboratory Scientists or technicians
26 a. Name (not real name): Balogun
b. SLT qualification: BTech
c. Reason for studying MLS later: To make up for the Human Medical aspects of my training that was not taken care of during my SLT training.
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: They will be killing the patient because they are not well grounded in handling the patient sample since the SLT training does not involve the medical training of handling the patient sample.
27 a. Name (not real name): Ganivat O.
b. SLT qualification: BSLT
c. Reason for studying MLS later: I realised it was not related to medical diagnosis as earlier assumed
d. Advice to SLT Practitioners who want to practise MLS: There are so many options within the SLT Course to specialise in. If not, dust your certificate and get trained in MLS School and get certified.
Conclusion:
There is no need for the confusion being orchestrated by the SLT practitioners. The views of their colleagues who later went back to the university to study MLS on the raging controversy constitute important evidence that puts this matter to rest.
Dr. Kemzi Elechi-Amadi writes from Por Harcourt, Nigeria
READ ALSO:
- MLS versus SLT Controversy: The Facts and Folly by Dr. Elechi-Amadi
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