Faculty Shortage: NMC plans to rope in Retired Army, Railway Doctors to teach specialised curriculum

New Delhi: Aiming to tackle the shortage of faculties in medical colleges, the National Medical Commission (NMC) is reportedly planning to fill up the vacant faculty positions with retired doctors from the army and the railways, Mint has reported.

NMC's decision to utilise the former army and railway doctors to deal with faculty shortage comes in the backdrop of the Economic Survey highlighting faculty shortages, which are affecting the quality of medical training.

The Commission is considering filling at least 700 such vacant positions across government institutes. These teaching faculties- retired doctors from the armed forces, railways, and Employees' State Insurance Corporation, will teach specialised curriculum in the post-graduate courses.

As part of the plan, NMC has already released the draft Teachers Eligibility Qualifications (TEQ) in the Medical Institutions Regulations, 2024 and asked stakeholders to submit their suggestions on that. 

Also Read: More Than Half of Faculty Posts Vacant in Punjab Medical Colleges: CAG Report

Commenting on this, an official told Mint, "TEQ will bene­fit at least 600-700 seats across gov­ern­ment insti­tu­tions. This will improve patient care and recruit meritorious fac­ulty. However, the TEQ pro­posal is with the health min­istry for fur­ther delib­er­a­tions and is delayed." Further, the official said that the delay is also affecting the potential increase of PG seats in the country.

"Spe­cial­ist med­ical officer of the Armed Forces hav­ing min­imum 8 years teach­ing exper­i­ence after obtain­ing the requis­ite recog­nized Post­gradu­ate qual­i­fic­a­tion in the sub­ject, of which at last three years as Asso­ciate Pro­fessor in a teach­ing hos­pital of the Armed Forces, with two Research pub­lic­a­tions under the rel­ev­ant pro­vi­sions can be con­sidered eli­gible for appoint­ment as Pro­fessor in the con­cerned sub­ject," the official mentioned, further adding that the similar provisions are being made in the case of returned doctors from railways and ESIC.

As per the recent data released by the National Medical Commission (NMC) on April 1st, there are 74,306 post­gradu­ate seats and 118,190 MBBS seats in the coun­try. This indicates that there is a significant shortage of specialists in cardiology, neurology, oncology and surgery. Till July 2024, NMC documented that the country had 13.8 lakh medical practitioners having an MBBS degree. Therefore, there is one MBBS degree holder per 1,263 people.

Commenting on the development of the faculty recruitment, a second official told Mint, "Until the TEQ is not passed by the gov­ern­ment, fac­ulty recruit­ment can­not hap­pen and it is delay­ing the pro­cess."

The official further added that the recruitment of faculty members is a huge process as the government has to provide designations like professor, assistant professor and association professor. "Without the des­ig­na­tions, these fac­ulty can­not work in the med­ical col­leges," added the official.

Also Read: Lack of PG medical seats, faculty shortage, infrastructure issues! Here are 7 top takeaways from Parliamentary Panel Report