Doctors who abuse the full payment patient scheme (FPPS) will barred from using this privilege, said Health Minister Dr S Subramaniam.

Subramaniam said while the system was introduced to allow doctors to earn extra income while serving public hospitals, mechanisms will be put in place to make sure their goal is still to serve the larger public.

"The system doesn't allow them to make hundreds of thousands of ringgit," he said while wrapping up the Health Ministry's part of the Budget 2017 committee stage debate.

The minister was addressing concerns that FPPS may be abused to the disadvantage of patients who can't afford it.

Patients who opted for the scheme could choose their own doctors and time of services. However this was limited to holidays and non-peak periods.

The government is hoping this would encourage specialist doctors to stay in the public service.

The FPPS system had been implemented in the Selayang and Putrajaya hospitals since 2007, and the government was looking to expand this to eight other hospitals in Peninsular Malaysia.

Subramaniam said to encourage doctors serving at public hospitals that don't offer FPPS, the ministry is considering a proposal to allow doctors to practice in the private sector one day every week.

This includes private medical practices, lecturing at teaching hospitals or performing independent research.

Negative effects

Earlier today Dr Michael Jeyakumar (PSM-Sungai Siput) expressed concern that FPPS may discourage government specialist doctors from looking after the average person who goes to public hospitals.

Jeyakumar said this was because the specialist doctors might only want to focus on delivering FPPS services.

"The possible impact (of FPPS) is that if I am a specialist doctor and want to relax a bit, I will get my assistant to do all my rounds and surgeries (during office hours).

"Because I want to concentrate all my energy on my private practice after 5pm," Jeyakumar said in a press conference in the parliament lobby today.

As such, he wanted the government to table a study on the effectiveness of the scheme, to show if care for regular patients would be affected.

"If it can be done without affecting service, go ahead. But what is the impact on ordinary patients?" he asked.

He also expressed concern that the scheme would discourage government doctors from serving in smaller hospitals in rural or remote areas that don't offer FPPS.