Is General Surgery as Specialsed Medical Branch Getting Extinct in Country?

Abstract

Today, in India, there are about 12,780 post-graduate seats in Master of Surgery of which there 1600 seats are in General Surgery offered by various Government and private medical colleges in India. There is a matter of grief situation that each year less number of undergraduates opting for the General Surgery branch. The foremost reason of it is that the amount of hardwork and stress which a trainee undergoes is incomparable to any other branch. Practicing General Surgery is not an easy job to have for anyone especially in an overpopulated country like India. Secondly, it is not a terminal branch as super-specialization in various disciplines is being offered after completion of postgraduation in General Surgery. So, again toiling for straight 3 years in General Surgery, a fresh Post Graduate (PG) has to again prepare hard to get into any Super-Specialty (SS) branch of his interest as only about 200 seats are being offered in various surgical super-specialty branches across the country. Finding General Surgery a hard road to walk, most undergraduates opt for less tiring branch which may also happens to be a terminal branch. The higher education in medical field is quite a costly affair owing to a few number of Government colleges offering the PG and SS seats. They may cost up to or more than one crore in many of the private medical colleges. To add to this is the ever increasing caste based reservation policy of the Government which is not doing justice to many according to many of the experts and educationists. All these factors result in many seats remaining vacant in the mentioned branch especially in SS across the country. Though the Government has established a new commission i.e. National Medical Commission (NMC) to look after the lacunae in the country’s medical education system, still there is lot that has to be done in this field. There aren’t sufficient faculty posts in the department of General Surgery and surgical super-specialties bearing burden over the system to look after increasing patient burden. General Surgery is the backbone of every institution and hospital which at present is overstressed thanks to the laid-back approach in policy making. Surgeon also has to face burnt of medico-legal proceedings every now and then in our country. Government is thumping it's back of opening more number of medical colleges in different states across the country but the fact is that nothing is on their agenda to improve the actual quality of medical education whatsoever is there. There is no concept of wet lab in surgery department even in various premium institutes of the country. There has not been any mentioning of arranging cadaveric dissection courses in the curriculum of post graduation. No fruitful research has come out from ages in the said department from so called research medical institutes. System has made the PG students to think each second about finishing off with their mandatory thesis work and pass the final exit examination without giving any attention to improve their clinical skills. And once they pass their examination, they start preparing for the entrance examination to get into SS branch of their choice. If this trend continues to work, time will come that patients will find it really tough to get well qualified surgeons for getting them operated in the country. Those who can afford will fly outside the country to get their ailment treated where better facilities are available as done by various dignitaries and politicians even now, whereas those who cannot afford to do so will ultimately succumb or may fall prey to the quacks. There is urgent need of revamp of the system where some better policies are being formulated to save this branch of medicine in our country. There is a need to ignite the interest among the medical undergraduates towards this branch so that more and more students should take up the General Surgery as their choice in future.