GUJRAT: At least two postgraduate programmes in Nawaz Sharif Medical College (NSMC) are yet to be accredited by the University of Health and Sciences as the varsity has not even paid an inspection visit despite a letter written to the UHS by the college principal.

The two PGs are Masters in Surgery (MS) and Masters in Medicine (MM) that are to be registered.

Another programme - Fellow College of Physician and Surgeons (FCPS) - which is being run at the NSMC does not have the accreditation issue.

As per the Punjab Health Programme, admission of doctors to all postgraduate programmes in 22 medical colleges will be given through central induction policy which has been introduced in 2017 after which more than 70 students have been enrolled on these programmes at the NSMC.

However, the registration of these postgraduate programmes has to be done by the UHS that has also yet to define terms of reference (TOR) for the visits and accreditation.

Gujrat chapters of Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) and Young Doctors Association (YDA) at a joint meeting the other day had announced staging a protest demonstration at the Aziz Bhatti Shaheed Teaching Hospital (ABSTH) on Aug 29 (today) against the non-registration of the postgraduate programmes.

PMA President Dr Maqsood Zahid told Dawn that the NSMC had not been taking interest in approval of the registration of the PGs due to which the trainee doctors would suffer.

He said the medical fraternity had been calling upon the respective authorities since long to take interest in resolving the issue which was ignored and that was why the agitation call had been given.

He demanded separation of the NSMC from the University of Gujrat (UoG) through declaring the medical college an autonomous institution like the medical colleges in neighbouring Sialkot and Gujranwala districts.

The NSMC had been a constituent college of UoG that’s vice chancellor is the competent authority to run the affairs of the college, including appointment of the college principal that too on acting charge basis due to which the college and its teaching hospital were facing a number of serious issues.

It merits mentioning that the NSMC do not have its own teaching hospital as the Aziz Bhatti Shaheed Hospital [formerly DHQ hospital] has been declared a teaching hospital back in 2014 by the Punjab government as a stopgap arrangement for five years.

Professor Dr Attique, the NSMC principal, said there had been no such issue of registration and accreditation for the postgraduate programmes since the UHS did not yet pay any such visits to medical colleges in Punjab; however, he said the NSMC had already written a letter to the UHS to pay inspection visit.

Adding he said he had also written to the provincial health department that if there was no accreditation of these PGs by the UHS then why were the students being inducted and sent to the medical colleges under these programmes?

Published in Dawn, August 29th, 2018