MEDICAL OFFICERS AND CLINICAL OFFICERS TRAINING DIFFERENCE AND SIMMILARITIES

MEDICAL OFFICERS TRAINING:
1)Is a six-year professional degree programme accredited by the Medical Practitioners and Dentists Board involving
2)Two years of pre-clinical training in medical sciences followed by
Four years of training in clinical medicine, surgery and community health including a mandatory one year internship and
Registration, licensing and gazettment by the Medical Practitioners and Dentists Board giving
Unlimited practice rights with
Specialisation and private practice allowed and eligible for full professional membership of the Kenya Medical Association (KMA)

CLINICAL OFFICERS TRAINING:
1)Is a four or five-year professional diploma or degree programme accredited by the Clinical Officers Council involving
2)One year of pre-clinical training in medical sciences followed by
Three or four years of training in clinical medicine, surgery and community health including a mandatory one year internship and
Registration, licensing and gazettment by the Clinical Officers Council giving
Unlimited practice rights with
Specialisation and private practice allowed and eligible for full professional membership of the Kenya Clinical Officers Association (KCOA)

The current training follows international guidelines and the two qualifications are awarded jointly on successful completion of a comprehensive nine trimester programme of full-time study, practicals and examinations which are covered over three years leading to a fourth mandatory year of internship in a teaching hospital. A fifth and sixth residency specialisation years are undertaken after registration by the Clinical Officers Council and three years of work experience in general medicine which leads to the award of a general degree in clinical medicine or a specialist
diploma in pediatrics, orthopedics , psychiatry ,
anaesthesia, reproductive health and other specialties.
A clinical officer is therefore able to graduate and join the workforce in a minimum of four calendar years and provides medical services within the full scope of family and emergency medicine or within a narrower scope depending on their area of specialisation.
Registration by the Clinical Officers Council (COC) entitles one to render medical services in any public or private medical institution or to practice medicine independently as a private practitioner. Registration also qualifies one to join and participate in the affairs of the Kenya Clinical Officers Association (KCOA) , including its annual KCOA Scientific Conference , and the
Kenya Union of Clinical Officers (KUCO) . As per the government’s Revised Scheme of Service for Clinical Personnel (2014) a clinical officer works at any of 8 grades depending on ones seniority.

As gazetted officers all registered clinical officers are legally authorized to prepare, sign, issue and keep safe custody of official state documents such as medical examination reports, sick notes , postmortem examination reports and death certificates and to appear in courts of law as expert witnesses. For this reason, a clinical officer is the officer in-charge of a health center or a district hospital and is part of the medical team in bigger hospitals where one may head a department or work under a senior clinical officer or a physician.
Clinical officers are direct healthcare providers who manage and administer health institutions, medical schemes and projects in primary healthcare (PHC) settings and are frontline stakeholders in Universal Health Coverage in
Kenya which is one of the key pillars of the government’s 5-year development plan under
President Uhuru Kenyatta . The four pillars of the 5-year development plan are

1.Manufacturing

2. Affordable housing

3.Universal Health Coverage

4. Food security .