Medicos Opposing National Medical Commission bill have severe lack of knowledge on it: Study

Members of IMA Medical Students Network (IMA-MSN) and those who participated in the protest rally, both had low awareness of NMC bill, found the authors

New Delhi: The dissolution of the Medical Council of India and its impending replacement with a newly constituted body-National Medical Commission has indeed become a matter of divide in the medical profession. While the central government has made its intention clear of bringing in the new commission, the Indian Medical Association has been staunchly opposing the move on various grounds, ever since the NMC Bill was put in the public domain.

The IMA opposition led to severe protests and rallies across the country, which saw strong participation from medical students. The IMA highlighted various its opposition on various features of the Bill, including lack of representation of the medical fraternity, bridge course for AYUSH, licentiate exam and many more.

While medicos across the country have shown a staunch opposition to the impending National Medical Commission Bill, there is a severe lack of knowledge on the bill itself amoung the medicos, a recent study has suggested.

The study which has been published in the recent edition of the International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health revealed that Medical students lack knowledge about the NMC bill, but have a strong negative attitude towards it.

Doctors who are associated with the Department of Community Medicine, Azeezia Institute of Medical Sciences and Research performed a  cross-sectional study among medical students in a private medical college in south India. A tool based on each section of the NMC bill was developed to assess knowledge. The attitude was assessed using a 5-point Likert scale. Separate knowledge and attitude scores were computed. Statistical analyses, Descriptive statistics, Chi-square test, logistic regression analyses were then performed.

The study revealed that among those tested only 31.49% had adequate knowledge of the NMC bill. The major source of information regarding the NMC Bill was social media (191; 81.28%), followed by newspapers (107; 45.53%). Further, those who were aware of the amendments to the bill; and who received information about the bill from newspapers were significantly more likely to have adequate knowledge.

The medicos through the survey were also if they were members of the Indian Medical Association Medical Student Network (IMA-MSN); and if they had participated in a protest rally organised by Indian Medical Association (IMA).

The study revealed that Participation in IMA protest rally was significantly associated with a negative attitude. However. the authors noted that surprisingly, among the sample, members of IMA Medical Students Network (IMA-MSN) and those who participated in the protest rally, both had low awareness of NMC bill (14.9% and 44.6% respectively)

The authors also found that those belonging to the main (regular) batch was significantly associated with a positive attitude towards the bill. Having said that the authors shared the result that Superior knowledge was not associated with a positive attitude towards the bill

The authors concluded that Medical students lack knowledge about the NMC bill, but have a strong negative attitude towards it, adding that a Negative attitude is significantly associated with participation in IMA protest rally against NMC bill.

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