Maharashtra: ‘Decision could raise concerns on quality of medical education’

Even as health academicians in the city are puzzled with the timing of the World Federation of Medical Education WFME recognition that 706 medical schools in the country got last week and the recent ldquoZero cut offrsquo notification passed by the apex medical regulatory body whether it will have any impact on the standardization of postgraduate medical education in India and its effect if at all on the overall health care system is to be seenDr Wiqar Shaikh professor of Medicine Grant Medical College and Sir JJ Group of Hospitals said he was absolutely shocked to know about the notification from the Director General of Health Services DGHS that the qualifying percentile for NEETPG 2023 for admission to postgraduate medical and dental courses in the country has been reduced to ldquoZerordquo The notification was released on September 20 The reduction in the qualifying percentile has been made applicable to all categories of candidateslsquoA bizarre decisionrsquoDr Shaikh said that the decision is bizarre ldquoIt will raise concerns regarding the quality of medical education in the country It could promote corruption and possibly stimulate an increase in fees in private medical collegesrdquo he saidDr Ketan Vagholkar DY Patil Medical College and Dr Subhash Hira University of WashingtonSeattleDr Shaikh added that the actual percentile required for PG Medical and Dental admissions until now was 50 from the general unreserved category and 40 for students from reserved categories He said that this decision on zero percentile has been implemented to fill all the PG clinical and nonclinical seats so that unlike previous years no seats are left vacantAlso read Mumbai J J group of hospitals set to undergo major revampDr Shaikh said ldquoThe WFMErsquos approval has 6 medical colleges Cooper Nair KEM Sion JJ and Somaiya hospital from Mumbai that were recognized last week Indian graduates can now pursue their PG education in countries such as the USA Canada Australia and New Zealand The government of India has spent R 320 crore towards the processing fees to obtain this approval The recognition is being looked forward to as students of these medical colleges can pursue their postgraduation from any PG colleges from these countries but will it really happen Only time will tellrdquoHe said the decision to reduce the percentile to ldquoZerordquo if and when noted by the WFME could lead to cancellation of approvals for our medical collegeslsquoWhole purpose defeatedrsquoDr Ketan Vagholkar professor of Surgery at DY Patil Medical College said ldquoBringing the qualifying mark to zero defeats the whole purpose of a PG medical entrance test There should be no compromise in quality and standards Just because there are no takers for the postgraduate seats we donrsquot have to provide substandard care to society by permitting doctors who do not qualify with the intellectual standards required for the jobrdquoDr Vagholkar added ldquoThe primary health care centres in the country need basic medical graduates as India still has a large rural sector Postgraduation is specialisation in different branches of clinical sciences The best of medical graduates are selected for postgraduation specialised medical courses Therefore stringent cut off in PGNEET is absolutely essentialrdquoNEETPG cutoff pros and consThe NMC decision on zero percentile in NEETPG was the demand for several years by IMA and other medical bodies due to discriminatory slabs of cutoffs in the past decades namely the general category students would qualify above 50 per cent but it was 45 for persons with disabilities and 40 for reserved category With zero percentile cutoff ie those scoring up to minus 40 in NEETPG examination will qualify for admissionldquoThe advantages of this change as seen by many education experts are that it eliminates discriminatory cutoff slabs for general versus disabled versus reserved categories It will ensure that qualified doctors with medical and dental degrees will be able to get admission to PG courses in India thereby reducing dependence on foreign universities Tons of nonclinical and paramedical course seats that were going abegging will now get filled and it will reduce the hangover of lsquoseat sellingrsquo of yesteryears Merit admissions will be retained by applying NEETPG scores in the systemrdquo said Dr Subhash Hira professor of Global Health at University of WashingtonSeattleWelcome moveDr Santosh Bansode emergency medicine specialist said ldquoItrsquos a welcome move as many seats which remain vacant each year because of no takers can be filled Students who qualify generally do not opt for subjects like physiology anatomy biochemistry so such seats remain vacant The problem is that after doing MD in Physiology or Anatomy or Biochemistry we can be professors teachers and since these are nonclinical subjects doctors who prefer clinical practice donrsquot opt for themrdquoldquoDoctors who did not qualify earlier might be interested in these nonclinical seats as sometimes nonclinical MD is better than plain MBBS I feel few doctors will want to take nonclinical subjects to do MD So even if NEET PG cut off is made zero still therersquos a high chance that seats for anatomy physiology and biochemistry will remain vacant as most doctors wish to do clinical practice or something related to clinical practice and very few doctors are interested in such purely nonclinical subjects By making the cut off to zero the government is doing its best Now it is fully dependent on what students want and what they wish to do in their futurerdquo Dr Bansode concluded