Medical teachers and students in the state have strongly opposed a move by Union health minister Anbumani Ramadoss to extend the five-and-a-half-year MBBS course by a year, with the last year as mandatory rural posting. They have said that the move will be counter-productive since fresh medical graduates will not be able to deliver the desired results.
“A fresh MBBS graduate is too inexperienced to handle crisis situations in a rural set-up, which will be unfair to the rural population,’’ a senior professor said.
Ramadoss is considering extending the course following recommendations by the National Rural Health Mission. A month ago, he had set up a high-level committee headed by additional director general of health services R Samba Siva Rao to ascertain the views of undergraduate and post-graduate teachers, medical teachers, parents and associated groups before implementation of the rural posting for medical graduates.
Accordingly Rao, on Wednesday, held a marathon meeting with medical teachers and students from 42 medical colleges across the state, senior officials of the medical education department and the directorate of medical education and research at JJ Hospital. Rao explained the proposal and said, “Our rural health care system is weak and we want it to strengthen in a time-bound period. Hence Ramadoss, on the recommendation of the rural health mission, has mooted the new concept.’’
However, medical teachers opposed the move and also raised the following objections. Students who want to continue post-graduate studies will be affected as a gap of one year in a non-academic environment will have an adverse effect on their studies.
The course is already long and adding a year is unfair. Making it compulsory with a meagre pay or stipend amounts to exploitation. It is likely that if this scheme is implemented, the number of posts in rural areas may be insufficient to accommodate all the graduates. In its report, NHRM has said that public health centres across India are poorly managed owing to acute shortage of manpower. In Maharashtra, out of the 6,000 public health centres, there are no doctors at at least 1,600 centres, while at 2,000 centres, the medical officers are appointed on adhoc basis for 11 months.
(Source)
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2 comments:
All the members of the Sambasiva Rao committee including rao himself are employed under Ramadoss. How can you expect an impartial conclusion of this committee?
Came across your blog while searching for "Rural Posting" news.When is the bill likely to be passed in the Parliament? Are the current batch of MBBS students doing their internship(completing by end Feb 2008) effected by this or is it for newer entrants from academic year 2008 -09?
Is the govt so lopsidedly concerned about only rural health? What about poor infrastructure, poor roads, still poorer literacy, poor power supply and management? How about posting fresh Engineering graduates in all desciplines rurally for a minimum period of three years(that will bring their stretch of studies at par with that of Medicos)No skimming the cream off at Campus interviews by the likes of Infosys, TCS, Wipro..or help earn for their families just after 4 years of study. Rurally posted medicos should be paid to the tune of at least 20 to 30 thousand. If this kinky Bill is passed, Medical colleges may run for half empty class-rooms from next year.
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