Medical Council of India (MCI)

The Medical Council of India (MCI) is a statutory body for establishing uniform and high standards and norms of medical education in India. It grants recognition of medical qualifications, gives accreditation to medical schools, grants registration to medical practitioners and monitors medical practices in India. Recently it has suffered from the following problems:

>There have been cases of colleges getting accreditation on basis of money without proper checks, even if facilities and faculties exist only on paper. This is due to vested corporate interests.
>The president of the MCI was arrested on charges of corruption raising questions on its efficacy.
>Cases of medical seats being sold in private institutions raise questions on the quality of the students. Such students are not chosen on merit and hence may indulge in malpractices like bribery, improper treatment, etc.
>Lack of transparency on its functioning has reduced its accountability thus giving leeway to corrupt practices.

REFORMS NEEDED:

>Separation of its functions, i.e. a separate body for accreditation (recommended National Medical Council), another for undergraduate and postgraduate training, assessment of institutions and medical ethics.
>Its members should include people from non medical fields and community health experts, so that public interests are promoted.
>Stricter accreditation standards with regular monitoring to ensure only quality institutions get accredited.
>Strict monitoring mechanisms to ensure that there is no corruption in medical schools.
>Transparency through publishing reports in order to increase accountability.
>An exit test, to ensure uniform standards among medical professionals can be introduced.

With these reforms, the quality of medical institutions, practitioners and medical practices will be improved.

MCI changes recommended by parliamentary standing committee

The medical council of india a body of high stature to oversee , regulate the medical education, institutions and doctors of this country has recently being made to be subject to some changes given its actions and recourses.

The parliamentary standing committee has provided a report on the basis of various reports including the recent ranjit roy committee and asked for the following changes.

It provides that MCI be replaced with new set of bodies as the architecture of MCI does not fall in place with present times. It calls for shifting from election to nomination, making different bodies to handle different issues like education, registration of doctors differently , handling medical colleges to make concerted effort and bring overall change to the medical education system in india

It has also recommended to revamp the curriculum to be in line with the disease profile of the country , to train MBBS students in district hospitals for more rural experience and to include research work in PG to promote the R&D in the country

However the committee has not clearly defined some issues dealing with the medical education

The up gradation of district hospital to medical colleges has not been touched. The case was put forth to reduce govts cost of building additional medical colleges. If the issue is not clearly stated the privatization of district hospitals going on like in Andhra Rajasthan will keep away poor from receiving healthcare and prove to be counter productive

Also the need for a survey of medical colleges for their standard check is missing. The survey like done in US and Europe for standard medical education is important to stop producing least quality doctors and decline the healthcare system

Health is an important aspect along with education for the growth of a country and the body and authority controlling and regulating it has to be of high stature and ethical sense.