KARACHI: Interactive curriculums for medical institutions
By Our Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Feb 12: A new curriculum for institutions imparting education and training in medical and health sciences has been formulated by the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council which will be implemented shortly.
The curriculum is interactive in nature and does not rely on lecture-based learning.
This was stated by Prof Sultan Farooqui, the President of the College of Physicians and Surgeons (CPSP), on Thursday at a press briefing. He claimed that the fellows and members of his college took part in the upgradation of the medical curriculum which has been carried out for the first time in Pakistan's history.
Answering a question, Prof Farooqui explained that since the new curriculum was based on problem-solving rather than lectures, all the medical institutions will soon see a shift towards interactive learning. The professor added that the CPSP had produced hundreds of professionals with the specific knowledge of teaching medical students.
Prof Farooqui informed the journalists present that a moratorium had been imposed on the opening of new dental colleges. "This is due to a shortage of specialist dentists in the country."
There were only 321 specialist dentists in the country against the total requirement of 440, each of the 20 dental colleges needing 22 specialists." Answering a question, Prof Farooqui pointed out that 15 dental colleges were in the private sector and only five in the public. The shortage in this area will be removed with the passing out of dentists from the CPSP.
He was of the view that with the establishment of medical universities in the public sector the standard of education in this sphere would improve tremendously. "I hope that the setting up of medical universities in the government sector would result in the establishment of quality laboratories.
"Also, the universities will be able to focus on research much more than do colleges. This can only be a good development as far as standard of medical education is concerned."
The professor pointed out that the country needed at least 60,000 specialists. "The CPSP has, since its inception, produced 12,000 specialists. And several thousand are in the pipeline."
In response to a question, he said when the people would not be provided quality healthcare at affordable rates they would turn to quacks, including homeopaths and pirs, who know how to exploit the people."
The need of the hour, therefore, was to provide quality care at affordable rates to the masses. The authorities should provide housing to all doctors posted at the healthcare units in the interior. A reasonable salary should also be given to them.
"Then if the doctors do not deliver the goods then people should be complaining about their apathy and carelessness." The CPSP's president Prof Farooqui said a congress would be held from March 7 to 9 by the CPSP, in collaboration with the Bangladesh College of Physicians and Surgeons. "For this joint congress as many as 300 doctors and surgeons would be coming to Pakistan."
More than 12,000 Pakistanis would be taking part in the congress making it the biggest of its kind in the country. About 110 research papers would be presented on the occasion.
Elaborating, the CPSP's president said the first congress in this series was held in Pakistan in 1993. "The second of its kind was held in 2001." The CPSP's training was recognized in several countries of the world, including Saudi Arabia and the United Kingdom.
