‘Bridging patient-doctor gap top priority’

Ensuring better patient-doctor relationship on campus would be the topmost priority for newly appointed vice chancellor of King George’s Medical University Dr Ravi Kant.

Addressing a press conference a day after taking charge, on Friday, Dr Kant said the reports of clashes between doctors and patients on campus had become common and were often triggered due to lack of communication. He indicated that if necessary, changes would be introduced into the curriculum to make doctors understand the need of better communication -- that is, how to behave with patients and their attendants.

“It is sad to see doctors and patient’s kin get entangled in ugly spats. But such incidents are common in India and far too less in foreign countries where doctors are trained in communication skills. Keeping this in mind we will try to introduce communication and behavioural training in the medical course,” Prof Ravikant said.

He also showed a ray of hope to patients undergoing treatment at KGMU, saying they could hope to get even better treatment and improved medical facilities here than what was available at the AIIMS, New Delhi. He, however, admitted that the KGMU would have to gear up to match up with the AIIMS standards. He also maintained that the medical university would hence lay more thrust on advanced researches.

“Georgians have made an indelible mark in the field of healthcare services across the globe and a large number of them are heading some major institutions across the world. My first priority will be to weed out individuals or group of people who do not work for betterment from KGMU. Corruption of any kind will not tolerated,” he stated.

The new V-C also assured to work towards plugging the gap between patient-doctor ratio, patient-bed ratio and patientnurse ratio. “If we get approval from the state government, we will try to add more staff to improve facilities,” he said.

Meanwhile, the KGMU teachers’ association extended full support to the new VC and expressed hope that the prevailing problems on the campus would end soon under his guidance. “Dr Ravi Kant is a Georgian, hence he understands the campus better than any outsider. We hope he will soon bring end to unnecessary problems on the campus,” said Dr Naim Ahmad, general secretary of the teachers’ association.