Doctors oppose appointment of non-medical graduates as faculty in medical colleges, stage protest

New Delhi: Opposing the appointment of non-medical graduates as faculty in medical colleges, doctors across the country have started raising their voices.

While recently the Indian Medical Association (IMA) wrote to the Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya in this regard, All India Pre and Para Medical Association organised a peaceful protest in this regard on July 20, 2023.

The peaceful protest against the appointment of non-medicos (without MBBS/MD/MS Degrees and without entrance examination in medical colleges) was held by the association at Jantar Mantar, National Medical Commission (NMC), and Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. Representatives from the Federation of Resident Doctors Association (FORDA) also participated in the protest.

In the letter addressed to the Union Health Minister IMA also appealed to allow only medical postgraduates as eligible candidates for appointment in the Medical colleges to uphold the CBME Syllabus with quality. The association also suggested that Non-Medical Postgraduates faculties continuing in Medical College be adjusted within the 15% limit already notified by the National Medical Commission (NMC).

"IMA firmly believes that in this era where thousands of postgraduate medical teachers are available in the paraclinical field, it is not advisable to compromise with the standard of medical education by allowing non-medical teachers who have no knowledge of Applied Medicine and undergraduate curriculum of MBBS to teach them on this subject," IMA mentioned in the letter.

"We appeal to the NMC and Ministry to kindly maintain the high standard of medical education to produce best doctors in our country and won't relax the high standards set by NMC. We request you to resist the appeal of non-medical graduates and allow only medical postgraduates as eligible candidates for appointment in the Medical colleges to uphold the CBME Syllabus with quality. The Non-Medical postgraduates' faculties continuing in Medical College shall be adjusted within the 15% limit already notified by the NMC," the letter directed to the Union Health Minister further added.

This comes after last month the Central Government issued a direction to NMC to bring amendment in the Teachers Eligibility Qualifications in Medical Institutions Regulations, 2022.

Also Read: Govt calls for amendment in NMC TEQ norms for non-medical teachers, NMMTA lauds move

National M. Sc. Medical Teachers’ Association (NMMTA) made the appeal to the Central Government as the eligibility for a non-medical faculty appointment in the Department of Pharmacology and Microbiology were not specified in the TEQ Regulations 2022.

"Applied Medicine is essential in the fields of Anatomy, Physiology, Biochemistry, pharmacology, and microbiology, to teach the relevance and importance in diagnosing disease and treatment and surgery. With out basic applied medicine knowledge of these pre-clinical subjects, students will not be able to understand and correlate the clinical studies and as only the MBBS graduates of medicine, after their postgraduation in the concerned subject, can teach the subject with applied medical importance in a comprehensive way. With the revised competency-based medical education (CBME), it is essential for the students to study these paraclinical subjects with integration into the clinical subjects. This integrative curriculum cannot be taught by non-medical postgraduates," the association mentioned in the letter.

The association further pointed out that the Non-Medical teachers organised as an association and filed a suit in the Supreme Court against the decision of the NMC and the Court refused to entertain it advising the Ministry and NMC to clarify this to the court in the coming hearing in July.

Appealing to the Health Minister to resist the appeal of non-medical graduates and allow only medical postgraduates as eligible candidates for appointment in the Medical colleges, IMA further mentioned, "We do hope, in the interest of quality and comprehensive empowerment, that the Ministry will allow the NMC's stand on TEQ to be implemented."

FORDA has also opposed the appointments of non-medicos in medical colleges and participated in the protest against the same. Speaking to Medical Dialogues, the General Secretary of FORDA, Dr. Sarvesh Pandey said, "It is a known fact that provision of Non Medical faculty in medical colleges was applied more than 50-60 years back just to assist the Medical teachers since number of Medical teachers was very less at that time."

"Gradually these Non Medical persons (without MBBS, MD/MS degree) were started to be appointed on faculty positions and provisions were made to allow their appointment upto an extent only in case of Non availalability of Medical teachers in these pre and para clinical subjects. But, by the time these provisions were being started misusing as reservation to Non Medical persons in appointments and private institutions took that as cheaper options against Medical teachers. Interestingly the degree of these Non Medical people (MSc,PhD) was neither registered nor recognized by any statutory body like MCI. So this provision was just a temporary arrangement and was only for the cases where there is non availability of Medical teachers," he further mentioned.

He further said how the availability of medical teachers increased and opined that CBME 2019 contained more and more clinical orientation and argued that it cannot be taught by persons who have not been exposed to clinical cases.

"So we FORDA request to NMC not to revert back from its formed regulations under no circumstances and also request to the Ministry not to pressurize an expert body which is constituted with an ambitious vision to make the health education system of the country at par with the global standards," mentioned Dr. Pandey.

"We requested to all organisations to come and join the protest in favour of medical fraternity and we will decide further plan of action on meeting with other organisations," he further added.

Back in 2020, after NMC took over MCI, it released a draft regarding Minimum Requirements for Annual MBBS admissions Regulations, 2020. The draft which was released initially for public feedback was along the lines of MCI norms. However, the finalized notification released through a gazetted notification on October 2020 halved the permissible percentage to 15% in Anatomy, Physiology and Biochemistry and completely removed for Pharmocology and Microbiology disciplines, which affected the Medical M.Sc/Ph.d community.

This resulted in a 65% reduction in Biochemistry, 50% in Anatomy and physiology, and 100% in Microbiology and Pharmacology. The reasons for such a move are thought to be the availability of sufficient medical teachers and the introduction of the new MBBS curriculum.

Medical Dialogues had earlier reported that the amendments brought by NMC were heavily criticized by non-medical teachers and students pursuing MSc courses. Demanding immediate rollback of the guidelines, teachers and students had converged at Jantar Mantar under the banner of the National M.Sc Medical Teachers' Association (NMMTA) as a part of the nation-wide protest against the sudden reduction in the percentage of non-MBBS teachers. Raising slogans denouncing NMC, the teachers and students had sought Health Ministry's intervention in the matter.

After considering the documents and submissions made by NMMTA, the Central Government opined that "NMC may continue to adopt the old pattern of permissible percentage of non-medical teachers for the time being subject to outcome of the pending court case."

Consequently, NMC had also issued a public notice in this regard and mentioned, "In compliance of the above-mentioned directions issued by Ministry of Health & Family Welfare vide order dated 03.01.2022, the provisions regarding percentage of non-medical teachers/number of faculty in the Department of Anatomy, Physiology & Bio-Chemistry would continue as per the Minimum Qualifications for Teachers in Medical Institutions Regulations, 1998."

Also Read: NMC reverses its Stand on TEQ norms for non medical teachers, says old rules will be followed