Challenges
in Medical Microbiology – Crisis in Medical Education In India
Basic sciences, including Microbiology
are foundations of Medical knowledge to make better Doctors. However it
continues to expand with many chapters with arrivals of emerging and
remembering microbes. The Universities and Medical council of India too
modified syllabus with great efforts, they made a Major question on Applied
Microbiology with will help a medical students to solve a clinical problem
puzzled with some signs and symptoms. If we realise the importance of
Microbiology, if one is good in basic aspects of Medical Microbiology they will
continue to be good in Community medicine, Medicine, as major topics are
related to Microbiology, and all other clinical subjects, even the sub
specialities as ENT and Ophthalmology contain a Major question on Infection
related problems. Many teachers have not tuned to realities of Microbiology and
its onward importance as Infectious diseases. When I interacted with many
Medical students, they say, do not remember the taxonomy, and Biochemical
reactions, I think it is unnecessary to emphasize
its importance, as it is important for the practising diagnostic
microbiologists, being a Post graduate examiner
many post graduates in Medical microbiology in colleges and institutes
with poor standards, and questionable reputation, cannot answer the types of
E.coli and do have no basic knowledge in
Enterobacteriaceae, and are
successfully getting MD degrees and
become teachers, as many private and some Government colleges are
pushing to society poor knowledged, MD’s and are in great demand because of the
Rapid expansion of Medical colleges, It is not just Microbiology every subject
in Medicine, many Deemed Universities have become centres of Give and take
degrees. Many Teachers wish to become
examiners without having one round teaching in the subject , to enjoy the Hospitality in Private Medical Institutes, Indian
system of Nursing education too suffers from pushing unnecessary topics on
Microbiology in the 1st year of Nursing, loaded with several subjects
in a prescribed period of less than year, there are no minimal qualified
teachers, really it is tragedy in many
private nursing institutes nobody knows how they are trained, Majority fail
when there is no copying or malpractices in the University and no university analyses why they are
failing, losing the valuable time of Human resource. I think if the nursing
students are made for Indian conditions and should delete unnecessary topics as
uncommon diseases, even beyond understanding of a MBBS graduate. It is high
time that we should realise and change the syllabus of nursing students in
Microbiology. I think we senior teachers too contributed to deteriorating
standards in every aspect of Medical education, we only blame the politicians
for the corruption and many ills, even today many touts, or even the staff
members collect the money to bribe to examiners in final year clinical
subjects, the good students who cannot contribute become the victims in the
game of malpractices, I am happy there are least chances to do such mal
practise in Kerala state. It has become
survivals game for the honest teachers, as we have little place to survive as
teacher. Many times I am reluctant to be an examiner to
postgraduates as our students are good
in theory but an average post graduates are not able to give a reasonable
comment on Gram’s stain which is just alphabet A. Many MD’s and M.Sc.’s facing
the threat of good technicians in Microbiology due to lack of knowledge in
minimal skills and fundamentals in Diagnostic Microbiology. Every person who
joins Microbiology should or will realise their real threat is not from
students or administers but their own Technicians. The Medical education is
going through commercialization and marketing of the results, which is going to
affect the nation’s health, and they are future Professors and administrators
of many medical colleges. Students too are active to assess our knowledge and
commitment, it is question many substandard teachers will grace music of
Darwin’s theory, when they fail to face the realities of the Society and should
not forget many good students are still the part of the system.
Dr.T.V.Rao MD professor of
Microbiology (email; doctortvrao@gmail.com
)
