FM DECEMBER 2018 ISSUE - digital edition

clinical practice
ALLOPATHS PROTEST
‘MYXOPATHY’
Medical bodies oppose states allowing bridge course to AYUSH practitioners
Even as the union cabinet struck
down the bridge course proposed
in the National Medical Commission
Bill for AYUSH doctors, it left it to the
state governments to take necessary
measures for addressing and promoting
primary health care in rural areas.
AYUSH stands for Ayurveda, Yoga,
and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and
Homoeopathy -- the traditional forms
of medicine practised in India. The
bridge course was proposed to enable
AYUSH doctors to practice and prescribe
allopathic medicine. The union cabinet
removed the provision from the bill after
a Parliamentary Standing Committee
recommended against making it a
mandatory part of the same.
The parliamentary standing
committee was set up following
objections raised by Indian Medical
Association, the largest body of
allopathy practitioners in India. IMA had
staged nationwide protests and alleged
that the move would promote quackery.
“IMA is against myxopathy and there
is no scope for any mixing. By allowing
ayurveda doctors to practice modern
medicine, you are giving a message that
they cannot treat common illness with
ayurveda,” said Dr. K.K. Agarwal, former
national president of IMA.
Even though the union
government removed the provision
of bridge course from the bill, the
Maharashtra government stated that
it would continue with a bridge course
started for homeopathy doctors to
enable them to practice allopathy.
Maharashtra government started a
one-year certificate course of Modern
Pharmacology in 2016 to train
homeopathy doctors in certain areas
EVEN THOUGH THE UNION
GOVERNMENT REMOVED
THE PROVISION OF BRIDGE
COURSE FROM THE NMC
BILL, MAHARASHTRA SAID
IT WOULD CONTINUE WITH
A COURSE STARTED
FOR HOMEOPATHY
of allopathy excluding major surgeries,
citing an acute shortage of doctors in
rural areas. Gujarat government also
recently invited applications for a sixmonth-long
bridge course for ayurveda
doctors to enable them to practice
allopathy. Though IMA’s Gujarat unit
approached the Gujarat High Court, it
referred the matter back to the state
health department.
But the All India Homoeopathy
Doctors Federation is very vocal in their
demand for bridge courses and has
staged protests against the decision
to remove the bridge course. The
Homoeopathic Medical Association
of India, which had earlier protested
against the provision of bridge course
in the bill, subsequently changed its
stand. “Now, the central government
has removed the provision of a bridge
course from the bill and given state
governments the power to decide
on the same. The requirement of one
state is different from another. If the
homeopathy practitioners are interested
to work with state governments after
undergoing the bridge course, we are
not against it,” said D. Bhaskar Bhatt,
President, The Homoeopathic Medical
Association of India. He added that it will
not have any impact on homoeopathy
practice in the country.
In another development, a
parliamentary standing committee has
recommended changes in the curricula of
modern systems of medicine as well as
AYUSH systems in an effort to integrate
medical education. The committee
observed that an integrated approach
would help in understanding the
strengths of each system of medicine.
Meanwhile, in a major relief to the
practitioners of Integrated Systems
of Medicine (ISM), the Supreme Court
recently ordered that no coercive
action shall be taken against persons
who are practising Integrated Systems
of Medicine pursuant to degrees or
diplomas obtained from universities
that are recognized for teaching the
same, till a decision is reached by the
court. The apex court’s interim order
came in a petition filed by All India
Indian Medicines Graduate Association
challenging the order of the Delhi High
Court that the ISM practitioners cannot
prescribe allopathic medicines. In their
plaint, the petitioners stated that ISM
practitioners undergo training in both
modern medicine and ISM as part of
their training.
66 / FUTURE MEDICINE / DECEMBER 2018