Brazil is facing a serious medical education crisis after a national exam revealed that around 13,000 final year medical students lack the minimum knowledge required to practice medicine safely. The findings come from the country’s first nationwide assessment of medical training and have sparked urgent debate about patient safety, academic oversight, and the rapid expansion of medical schools.
The results have shocked health authorities, educators, and professional bodies, especially as many of the students who failed are only months away from graduation and entering the healthcare system.
The Ministry of Education conducted the first edition of the National Student Performance Exam for medicine, known as Enamed. Nearly 90,000 students from about 350 medical programs across Brazil took part in the test.
The exam showed that 25 percent of students failed to demonstrate basic medical competence. One in three medical schools performed poorly, with fewer than 40 percent of their students reaching the minimum required level. Around 13,000 students in their final year did not pass.
These results have raised serious concerns about whether some graduates are prepared to diagnose illnesses, prescribe treatments, or manage patients safely.
Medical schools with weak results will no longer be allowed to increase student intake. In more severe cases, authorities may require institutions to reduce the number of students they admit.
The Federal Council of Medicine has warned that allowing underprepared graduates to practice could place patients at risk. Discussions are underway about possible measures to prevent students who fail the exam from automatically entering the profession.
The poorest results were concentrated in private and municipally run medical schools. Many of these institutions charge high tuition fees despite delivering weak academic outcomes.
In contrast, federal public universities performed significantly better in the exam rankings. The findings highlight deep inequalities in medical education quality across the country.
Several low scoring programs charge monthly fees ranging from 1,100 to 2,600 dollars. This is particularly striking in a country where the minimum monthly wage stands at about 313 dollars.
Education Minister Camilo Santana defended the exam, saying it was designed to improve training standards rather than punish students or institutions. He pointed out that private medical school admissions nearly doubled between 2016 and 2022, a growth that made stronger oversight unavoidable.
Brazil has long struggled to place doctors in poor and remote regions. Previous government efforts focused on filling staffing gaps rather than controlling training quality.
Programs such as Mais Médicos helped increase doctor numbers, including through foreign recruitment. Under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the initiative has expanded again, with more than 27,000 doctors deployed over the past three years.
(Rh/ARC)