Why do doctors think they are special creations?

Your news item on page 2 of the Sunday Times of July 29, refers to the Medical doctors who are requesting for special privileges, namely - on school admissions for their children, enhanced salaries etc.

As for me, I am a PhD Engineer who served in the most outlandish generating stations - no private practice to mint money, finding it difficult to meet daily expenses and not being able to send my children abroad for education, leave alone getting them admitted to a decent school/college in Colombo, BUT not forgetting I was a product of free education right up to my BSc Engineering at the then University of Ceylon and partly funded for my PhD.

I don’t crow about the trials and tribulations one faces at our generating stations to maintain uninterrupted power supply in the island even working right round the clock attending to faults on the machines.

We remain thankful to the modern innovations and instrumentation at our stations which help us to even carry out preventive maintenance as against waiting for breakdowns and power outages. Compared to the very basics at our old Laxapana generating station as against the recent stations like Samanalawewa having fibre optics control systems.

The medical doctors need to realise that their present day work is far easier (pardon me for saying “simple”) than that of their predecessors.

Very soon artificial intelligence software (not written by or based on information given by them) will assist in diagnosis and suggest what tests are needed and also indicate what medicines could be used.

Diagnosis is made very much easier due to the numerous machines made available to them. Those who designed / made / tested these machines and those who maintain them now are equally important actors in this whole picture of curing patients in the medical sector. (Please see below a list of some of the machines used by doctors)

Furthermore - the days of listing out various “ingredients” to instruct the dispenser to make a “powder” for the patient to be given orally are over - also a mixture (shake the bottle ) are now all gone. It is the researcher and the pharmaceutical factories who now have flooded the market with various tried and tested drugs - which the medical doctors prescribe. (Pardon me - after being subject to intense persuasion - and incentives dangled in front of them). There are reference books for the “drug of choice” as well. Also there is a wealth of information they can refer to on the Internet when at home - after their hard days work !

Even in the field of surgery the medical doctors depend on robotics designed by Engineers and maintained by them. Precise key hole surgery all assisted by machine robotics. Skill is required just as much as a good technician whose skill is of utmost importance when intricate equipment is dismantled / put together, Use of laser in surgery etc have built-in safety features as well.

As such medical doctors fall into one link in the chain which goes into curing a patient . Therefore if the government gives into such unreasonable draconian demands - we could also rise up and demand equal treatment (no pun intended ! ).

I need not mention the trials and tribulations we (engineers) went through during the last JVP insurrection where some of us had to meet in each others’ homes to map out our day-to-day work and to don army uniforms to attend to destroyed transmission towers. In fact our breed (i.e. engineers) should ask for much more benefits than the medical doctors. Some of us work not in air-conditioned rooms but in the blistering sun - inside dewatered tunnels with tons of water on the other side in the reservoirs - which could lead to a major disaster in case the “gates” give way.

I think the time has come for all to voice their opinion about the demands of medical doctors.

Also the Government should take bold steps to allow foreign countries to open medical colleges here – regardless of protests from doctors here. Have people with a back bone in the Medical Council to take bold decisions and also let us have politicos who do not bend to such demands but act boldly.

Here are some machines used by the medical fraternity: Pulse oximeters, Electro stimulation, Ultrasound units, Electro-surgery equipment, ECG machines, Magnet Therapy, Audiometry equipment, Ultrasound equipment, Nebulisers, Spirometers, Angel sounds fetal heart monitor, Medical monitors, Holters, Surgical suction machines and much more.

So - my dear doctors you all should not consider yourselves as special creations.

Nandanee Gunawardane Via email