Islamabad: Rejecting allegations of bias and discrimination, the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council on Thursday defended the National Registration Examination as a transparent, standardised and legally mandated screening mechanism, insisting there would be no compromise on merit or patient safety despite protests by foreign medical graduates.
The clarification came after foreign trained doctors held a press conference at the National Press Club, where they criticised the latest NRE results and demanded a review of the examination process.
PMDC officials, however, said the examination was conducted strictly in line with the law and international best practices.
According to the council, the National Registration Examination is conducted exclusively by the National University of Medical Sciences (NUMS), which has been entrusted with paper setting, examination conduct, evaluation, compilation and declaration of results to ensure credibility, integrity and transparency.
They stressed that PMDC has no role in the development of question papers or preparation of results.
Officials said the NRE is a two-step examination held at least twice a year under an Act of Parliament, with a clearly defined syllabus aligned with the MBBS and BDS curriculum taught in Pakistan. Candidates are required to secure 60 percent marks to pass, and there is no negative marking.
They added that detailed results are made available through an official online portal and that candidates are provided the option to apply for re totalling. For the NRE Step I conducted in December 2025, only two candidates sought re totalling of their results, officials said.
The council maintained that all procedures were carried out robustly and transparently, and that no discrimination was exercised at any stage of the examination process. Any allegations regarding lack of transparency, officials said, were baseless.
The latest clarification follows the release of NRE Step I results which revealed a nationwide pass rate of just over 20 percent, with not a single candidate qualifying from eight countries where Pakistani students are enrolled in large numbers.
Regulators say the pattern of failures points to systemic weaknesses in medical education in certain foreign institutions rather than flaws in the examination itself.
PMDC officials warned that allowing inadequately trained doctors to enter Pakistan’s healthcare system would pose a serious health security risk, particularly in public hospitals already under severe strain. They also cautioned that performance could deteriorate further in NRE Step II, which assesses clinical competence and patient management skills.
While acknowledging the concerns raised by foreign medical graduates, the regulator said the NRE remains a mandatory requirement aimed at standardisation, quality assurance and protection of patients, and that there would be no dilution of standards under pressure.
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