‘Tuitions burning out medical students’
TNN | Jan 10, 2017, 06.00 AM IST
KOLKATA: Most students who manage to crack the entrance test to medical colleges today are so exhausted by that time that they lose all enthusiasm to pursue the course, said Mammen Chandy, director of Tata Medical Centre, Kolkata, and one of the leading haematologists of the country, at the Presidency bicentenary celebrations on Monday. The students are burnt out and just sit in class, tired and unable to focus at all. Unless a drastic change is brought into the present intake system of medical colleges, it will be difficult to train firebrand doctors in a country where the proportion of doctor to patient is heavily skewed, he added.
Speaking on 'Making Medical Education Relevant to the Challenges of Tomorrow', Chandy said,"Most doctors who are coming out with degrees today are products of these myriad coaching centres. From Class IX onwards, parents start grilling their children about either becoming a doctor or an engineer. Most of these kids do not have any aptitude for such professions and yet they are pushed into them. After their plus two, they lead a life of imprisonment under the care of these coaching centres, cramming multiple choice questions by rote."
It is the Kolkata parents who are foremost among sending kids to
coaching centres, Chandy said. He also felt that the content taught in
medical classrooms needs an overhaul and students should be personally
mentored and taught to solve problems and not just cram information.
"What is happening to such human machines in medical college classrooms is that they are looking for redemption in that BMW car that they aspire to own instead of handholding patients and not leaving their side till either they are dead or have recovered," Chandy said. He drew parallels from the system of education that groomed doctors when he was a student at the Christian Medical College, Vellore, when living in villages for prolonged periods was mandatory.
Chandy showed his displeasure towards the way in which the Medical Council of India doesn't have a strict governance code for doctors. This would ensure competence, he felt.
"Our doctor-patient ratio is 1:2000, much worse than even Pakistan's, which is 1:400, leave alone the US at 1:320 or Cuba at 1:170. In Cuba, medical education is free and every graduate serves the community for two years. Contrast this with the fact that huge capitation fees are charged by private medical colleges in the country and more than half the seats are in private colleges."
TNN | Jan 10, 2017, 06.00 AM IST
KOLKATA: Most students who manage to crack the entrance test to medical colleges today are so exhausted by that time that they lose all enthusiasm to pursue the course, said Mammen Chandy, director of Tata Medical Centre, Kolkata, and one of the leading haematologists of the country, at the Presidency bicentenary celebrations on Monday. The students are burnt out and just sit in class, tired and unable to focus at all. Unless a drastic change is brought into the present intake system of medical colleges, it will be difficult to train firebrand doctors in a country where the proportion of doctor to patient is heavily skewed, he added.
Speaking on 'Making Medical Education Relevant to the Challenges of Tomorrow', Chandy said,"Most doctors who are coming out with degrees today are products of these myriad coaching centres. From Class IX onwards, parents start grilling their children about either becoming a doctor or an engineer. Most of these kids do not have any aptitude for such professions and yet they are pushed into them. After their plus two, they lead a life of imprisonment under the care of these coaching centres, cramming multiple choice questions by rote."
"What is happening to such human machines in medical college classrooms is that they are looking for redemption in that BMW car that they aspire to own instead of handholding patients and not leaving their side till either they are dead or have recovered," Chandy said. He drew parallels from the system of education that groomed doctors when he was a student at the Christian Medical College, Vellore, when living in villages for prolonged periods was mandatory.
Chandy showed his displeasure towards the way in which the Medical Council of India doesn't have a strict governance code for doctors. This would ensure competence, he felt.
"Our doctor-patient ratio is 1:2000, much worse than even Pakistan's, which is 1:400, leave alone the US at 1:320 or Cuba at 1:170. In Cuba, medical education is free and every graduate serves the community for two years. Contrast this with the fact that huge capitation fees are charged by private medical colleges in the country and more than half the seats are in private colleges."
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