Preparing the Health Care Professional in India – Concerning Training and Other Issues

Training of medical professionals in India has over time become mostly concerned with the acquisition of knowledge at the cost of attitudes and skills. Complete healing (physical, mental and social recovery) requires not only technical expertise but also care and compassion. The main forces driving the medical industry today seem to be the pharmaceuticals industry and that of medical equipment. These forces are also seeping into the training of medical professionals creating business minded doctors with a view to profits. In settings like government hospitals, corporate hospitals and private health care facilities, how will soft skills like ethical decision making and dealing with patients with care and compassion be imparted to the new generation of medical professionals? The solutions lie in improving student's attitudes, redefining the role of teachers, creating a relevant training environment, bridging the preventive and curative medicine divide, devising better evaluation systems, altering family and society's expectations, ensuring research oriented training, helping doctors to be managers, freedom from high tech anxiety, career counselling and imparting communication skills. There is a need to move from a knowledge based, inadequate and narrow disease oriented training to a comprehensive, skill based and health oriented approach.