In the UK, one cannot visit a specialist doctor straight on one's own. A general practitioner will decide if seeing a specialist is clinically necessary for a patient. A specialist will only see a patient with a referral letter from his or her general practitioner.

Not just in government hospitals, a private specialist will also ask you for a referral from your general practitioner.

But, in Bangladesh, specialists are generous enough in seeing as many patients as they can, and patients are free to self-refer to any specialist they like.

People with symptoms of simple ailments, which can easily be treated at the primary level, tend to see specialists, creating a huge rush at medical college hospitals and private chambers of senior physicians in the cities.

This overflow of patients, mostly unreferred, leads to inferior quality of services, causing patients' dissatisfaction and depriving critically ill patients of due attention and care.