Maharashtra begins Covid management orientation programme for MBBS graduates

On Wednesday, final year medical (MBBS) students sat through day one of the Covid-19 pandemic management orientation programme, following a recent circular from the Maharashtra University of Health Sciences (MUHS) directing mandatory attendance for the online course

On Wednesday, final year medical (MBBS) students sat through day one of the Covid-19 pandemic management orientation programme, following a recent circular from the Maharashtra University of Health Sciences (MUHS) directing mandatory attendance for the online course.

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The purpose of the programme, said MUHS, is to train final year medical students for the ongoing pandemic and immediately put to use their knowledge and skills for Covid-19 patient management during their internship training programme.

To be conducted in the virtual mode and relayed on YouTube till April 24, students will also be allowed to put forth their questions on the chat window that will be answered by experts.

“Our country is currently suffering from an infectious disease and the state of Maharashtra, in particular, is facing a shortage of trained medical manpower to manage the present situation,” read the circular released by MUHS this week.

Last year, after much deliberation, the board of governors (BoG) of the Medical Council of India (MCI now National Medical Commission) had released a pandemic management module to be implemented across all medical institutions starting August 2020.

Put together by a team of experts and the academic cell of MCI, the module has been designed to ensure MBBS students acquire competencies in handling not only the illness but also the social, legal and other issues arising from disease outbreaks.

“The emergence of Covid-19 and its rapid spread across the globe has further underlined the need to develop these skills in our graduates. One of the desirable outcomes of the competency derived education program is to enable a medical graduate to be able to understand, investigate, treat and prevent new and emerging diseases,” stated the BoG released last year.