PMC waives condition for doctors

Balwant Garg

Tribune News Service

Faridkot, January 13

The Punjab Medical Council (PMC) has waived the mandatory continuous medical education (CME) credit hours for renewal of registration of all practising doctors in the state.

To ensure that doctors keep upgrading themselves on the latest advancement in technology and medical science in their respective specialties, 50 CME credit hours were compulsory for the renewal of PMC registration so far.

However, for the low renewal of registration by doctors with the PMC in recent times, the council has decided to allow exemption from the mandatory credit hours for the renewal of registration.

“This is one-time exemption, allowed only up to March 31,” said Dr Sanjeev Mahajan, registrar of the PMC.

All members of the PMC have decided that renewal of doctors, who have not renewed their registration irrespective of time lapse, be given exemption from the mandatory CME credit hours, said Dr Mahajan.

Continuing medical education (CME) refers to a specific form of continuing education that helps those in the medical field maintain competence and learn about new and developing areas of their field. 

These activities may take place as live events, written publications, online programmes, audio, video, or other electronic media. 

Content for these programmes is developed, reviewed and delivered by faculty who are experts in their individual clinical areas.

There is so much confusion and discrepancies with regard to the required credit hours, award of credit hours and exemptions, between various state medical councils.

In Punjab, a doctor requires 50 credit hours for five years. In Karnataka, these are stipulated at six credit hours per year (30 for five years). In Gujarat, it is 30 CME credit hours per year i.e. 150 hours for five years.

The general body meeting of the MCI, in February 1997, had recommended 30 credit hours per year i.e. 150 credit hours per five years.

Post-graduate (PGs) medical students in Punjab get 10 credit hours per year, but in other states, PGs would get only four credit hours per year. 

In Punjab, only PG teachers would get four credit hours per year, but elsewhere, all medical teachers would get four credit hours per year. In Tamil Nadu, they would get six hours per year.

While MBBS doctors can attend CME of any specialty, at least 50 per cent of the CMEs should be from the particular specialty or discipline that the doctor belongs to while the remaining 50 per cent workshops can be attended from any relevant discipline.

There are often complaints from critics that drug and device manufacturers often use their financial sponsorship to bias CMEs towards marketing their own products. 

It is alleged that drug and device manufacturing companies can easily pitch topics designed to attract commercial sponsorship. The companies like to sponsor the programmes that support their marketing strategies, allege critics.