Tuition classes in medicine

This has reference to ‘Learning and teaching outside medical colleges’. Dr. Bhatt’s arguments would have been ignored as a pathetic attempt to promote private tuitions for medical students if it were not through the otherwise serious publication concerning important issues in medical ethics.

Dr. Bhatt’s interpretation of the reasons for imparting knowledge to medical students outside medical colleges, in closed door air- conditioned rooms equipped with computers, video tapes and other communication gadgets as enumerated by him, could be innocently original but are breathtakingly mindless as the very basis of medical teaching is missing in those tuition classes – the patients.

No skills can be taught by creating situations and role models. There is no other place for medical students to learn but in the medical colleges and by the patient’s bedside.

Perhaps Dr. Bhatt and others like him have forgotten to make the important distinction between educating and training to pass examinations.