SAITM issue: Abuse of the system and penalised students
hospitals where they are exposed to a large spectrum of patients, both emergency and of a routine nature, often with end stage pathology. The patients are helpful to the students. It is indeed a luxury. Many foreign medical schools, especially in Europe, do not have enough non-paying patients in their clinical floors, that they resort to well-trained actors, simulators to give their students adequate “clinical” experience. This is the situation in many advanced countries. The GMOA barricading hospitals, preventing clinical training for private students is downright unfair. However, I take their point -- the Government need not provide such facilities for private fee levying schools, if they cannot do so.
The children are Sri Lankan, they have no choice if they were born in big cities and are being unfairly dealt with. Let those who have qualified from SAITM sit a final exam in any Government medical school, I am sure they will do well, for, I have heard from Examiners from Government medical schools who examined them say that they did well. This will expose the real truth that belies the claims of their inadequacy! It is noted that they could not have got the all-important practical emergency care that one gets in a state hospital. To be pragmatic, the UGC has granted the SAITM the recognition to train. The parents took it on its word and sent their children. Rectify the past mistakes and restart the process on a clean slate. The Government should take over the Neville Fernando Hospital. There should be selection criteria acceptable to all stakeholders -- start again, after addressing the grievances of those who have qualified from SATIM fairly.
In conclusion, I would like to comment on a newspaper account I saw recently, of a Parliamentary committee on private medical education tying such educational Institutions to State medical schools in the future. This is a sensible move and I think a brilliant alternative. (The writer is a former Professor of Surgery, University of Peradeniya)