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Rattled by the COVID-19 pandemic ravaging the country since end of March Medical Council of India (MCI), sole body monitoring medical education across states and union territories, has decided to introduce pandemic management module in the syllabus of MBBS course.
With this move medical students from now will learn about pandemic management along with its social, legal and other aspects in the undergraduate medical course of five years.
The prime aim to introduce the new module is to make the would-be doctors prepared on how to face challenges posed by pandemics like novel coronavirus infections in the country.
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The board of governors (BoG) in suppression of the MCI of felt that the pandemic management module extending from foundation course to the final year programme in the undergraduate medical study would help in ensuring the creation of a young MBBS doctor who would serve humanity as physician, leader and healer in the trying times particularly when a pandemic hits.
Dr V K Paul, chairman of the BoG, has already stated this new module in the MBBS curriculum in his forward note. The document related to the details of the module to be adopted by respective medical colleges has been put together by a team of experts and academic wing of the medical council.
The initiative of the programme will enable the young MBBS doctors to be prepared for the unknown – to be able to understand, investigate, treat and prevent new and emerging diseases with their clinical eyes, community leadership and healing touch.
The module has been outlined in a phased-based manner and it is expected that the programme will be covered by an interdisciplinary team under the curriculum committee of the respective medical colleges in the country.
One of the greatest challenges that the medical fraternity across the world is currently facing is the Coronavirus Pandemic, in the light of which the apex medical regulator decided to bring in this new module.
Dr Debashis Bhattacharya, director of medical education (DME), was not available for comment on the MCI initiative.
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