Urgent Need for Quality Medical Eduaction highlighted @ 2 days Roundtable Conference of VCS of Medical Universities at Tirupati

 Airing concerns over annual drainage of Rs.100,000 crores out of country by students flying abroad for advanced studies, Association of Indian Universities (AIU) President Prof P.B Sharma implored Vice chancellors of various universities to create atmosphere of quality education at par or even better than currently offered by advanced nations across the world.

    Speaking at the Roundtable of VCs of Health Science Universities at  Tirupati, Prof Sharma in his presidential address said a large number of bright students are going abroad for studies at a heavy cost while the government expenditure on education, including higher education, is barely Rs79,685.95 crore for the education sector for financial year 2017-18.

 Further, of the total outlay, Rs46, 356.25 is for the school sector and the rest for higher education.

 He said such a scenario has put an added responsibility on Vice Chancellors to create an environment of quality education at par or even better than currently offered by the advanced nations of the world, so as to halt mad rush for foreign degrees and qualifications at the same time attracting in great numbers foreign students from both the developing as well as developed countries to India for education and research in our universities.

According to him, there is a massive rise in the number of students enrolled for higher education in India, which reflects the rising aspirations of the society. But that rise should be well-matched by better infrastructure and financial support to avoid creating heaps of mediocrity in field of higher education.

The more Indian universities imbibe and function on principles of meritocracy, trust and empowerment, the outcome and products of the universities will be acknowledged worldwide and “we can move up in league of world class universities.”

He noted with satisfaction that the Government is committed to promoting quality research in our universities by attracting brilliant minds to come forwards for research. The recent initiative of the Government of creating 2000 research fellowships of   Rs 70,000 pm for IITs and IISc  is highly welcome, but then let it be extended to high performing government and self-financed universities as well in areas of research of high importance to our nation.
  The conference was opened by Dr Soumya Swaminathan, Director General of ICMR who has been appointed as  Dy. DG of WHO.

“We need also to significantly increase Post-Doctoral Fellowships in our universities, especially in our medical universities so as to attract the brilliant minds to continue to focus on cutting edge research of high relevance to advancing the frontiers of medical sciences.”

There is  also a need  to foster a much greater collaboration and cooperation between universities and universities within as well as out of the country between universities and Industry and corporate and between universities and society to succeed in our quest to achieve the goal of academic and research relevance driven excellence.

 He said at  Amity University Gurgaon, where he is currently VC , though does not have a medical college, but recognizing the need for synergy between applied  sciences, engineering and allied medical disciplines, they have  focused attention to vision science and engineering(Optometry), imaging technologies, biomedical engineering,   acoustic science and sound engineering (Audiology) and they are pursuing frontal research on MDR and Cancer Research, Lipidomics, and advanced structural biology  in the Institute’s  Biotechnology department. He hoped the two days roundtable will create the desired synergy and spirit of cooperation and collaboration and sharing of best practices among the universities.

 Dr Soumya Swaminathan, Director General of ICMR and Secretary, Department of Health Research, Dr Ravi Kumar, Director cum Vice Chancellor Sri Venkateswara Institute of Medical Sciences, Triupati, and many Vice Chancellors, were present there.

He said the world is heading for the new knowledge age. A new age, a new era and a new Century that is the Century of Mind and a Century ushering a new hope to wipe out misery, hunger, disease and unemployment from the face of the humanity and create a global society, global citizenship cutting across the barriers of nationality, barriers of race, religion, color, caste and economic disparity to create everlasting peace and harmony among people of the world.

“A great promise awaits us at the dawn of the new age that has already begun to invigorate our minds on the exciting opportunities that lie ahead for the experienced and enlightened faculty and budding medical professionals in our universities to make a profound contribution to the advancement of the frontiers of knowledge of medical sciences and making it possible to create a heaven on earth and happiness all around.”

He said that the basic purpose of medical science education and research is to serve the people, wipe out their tears, and eradicate their sufferings, eliminate disease and to educate and empower them with wellness give them a life full of bliss and happiness. This requires more than the knowledge and capabilities of modern medical science and health care profession.  It is this “privilege to serve and privilege to excel” that should over score on any other consideration when it comes to practicing as medical professionals.

“We need to create some space in our curriculum to this aspect of humanism so that we succeed in creating medical professionals for whom “Service over self” shall be the mission of life.  Similar sentiments have also been echoed by Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of WHO “WHO’s work is about serving people regardless of who they are, poor or rich, displaced or disabled, elderly or the youth. Most importantly, it’s about fighting to ensure the health of people as a basic human right”.

But then Health is not just fighting the disease as has been voiced by WHO “Health is defined as a state of complete physical, mental and social well being and not merely absence of disease or infirmity”.

“To this we may add in our context “Spiritual well being” also.  Good health confers on a person freedom from illness and the ability to realize one’s physical, mental and spiritual potential. Health is therefore, best understood as the indispensable basis for defining a person’s sense of well being.  The health of a nation is judged by the health of its people. It is here in this context we find that despite a commendable progress made in the arena of health care and medical research, our hospitals are as crowded as railway stations, the disease is prevalent and suffering has no end.

As such, we can well understand the link between the health of environment, work life and human health. Concurrent actions are required to improve the health of environment, quality of air, water and food and also rediscovering the joy of living a life full of harmony and happiness.  Physical and mental fitness with the practice of yoga and meditation along side with creating a spiritual awakening to drastically reduce the mounting trauma and stresses due to our work life shall do wonders.

“The prime question is what we do in our curriculum design and in research to promote this concept of holistic health and well being. Though India is cheaper than many advanced countries of the world in respect of medical and health care services, yet the ever escalating cost of medical treatment in India is a matter of great concern to our large populace. Disease does not differentiate between rich and poor, literate or illiterate, able or disabled. As such achieving the goal of affordable health care is something we cannot put on the back burner. May be we are at a highly opportune time in our country to rediscover the value and worth of our traditional knowledge and indigenous herbal medicines that have stood in good deed for millions of years before the advent of the modern medical sciences. But here again we need to pay a much greater attention to the scientific research and drug discovery using our most modern tools and instruments so as to scientifically derive a much greater value from our traditional herbs and local medicines. This calls for a greater investment on R&D in AYUSH.”

He drew the attention of the VCs of the medical universities towards the dire need to create the vital synergy between education and research, synergy between medical science and ever advancing frontiers of biological sciences and biotechnology, integration of medical science and engineering and promotion of integrative sciences and interdisciplinary education and research.

He said modern research in medical and biological sciences being expensive, the set up should stress need to increasingly focus of translating our research outcome into patentable IPR so as to succeed in recovering the cost of investment in research.

He appreciated that ICMR, DBT and DST are generously supporting the growth of quality research in our universities as such it is the responsibility of all that the investment in research creates “Advantage India” in respect of drug design and discovery and also improving the efficacy of health care at an affordable cost.