Online Courses in Health Care From Apollo Hospitals and Medvarsity
Medvarsity is India’s first medical e-learning venture which is an initiative by the Apollo Hospitals Group. It offers a variety of quality medical education courses for Doctors & Graduates with placement assistance.
The current status of Medical Education
Healthcare is one of India’s largest sectors, in terms of revenue and employment, and the sector is expanding rapidly. By 2012, India’s healthcare sector is projected to grow to nearly $40 billion. In the past 10 years, the number of medical colleges have grown by 54% and at present there are 314 medical colleges in the country with an admission capacity of 35500 (MCI). In addition, the health care infrastructure under Department of alternative medicine (AYUSH) available in India consists of 3439 undergraduate colleges, 96 colleges having Post Graduate Departments and 6.95 lakh registered practitioners of Indian Systems of Medicine and Homoeopathy in the country. There are 16000 postgraduate training seats in the country across all disciplines, for which there are almost 75000 aspirants each year. This number is grossly unrelated to the number of graduates, the specialty proportions, skill mix or manpower required to meet our healthcare and teaching needs. This implies that the remaining medical graduates are getting into the healthcare system without further training in areas of their choice. This situation has resulted in unidirectional and imbalanced growth with a mismatch between our needs and the manpower being developed. It requires urgent attention. Teaching methodologies need to be changed from chalk and talk to include computer assisted learning. In the present scenario, it is imperative to make effective use of communication technology by making the methods of teaching / learning compatible.
The Need
Quality of health care is mainly dependent on the level of the knowledge, skills
and the experience of the Health Care Providers (HCP). Medvarsity is playing a vital
role in educating and updating the knowledge of HCP of the country. It acts as a
catalyst for the knowledge acquirement of various groups of HCP. This online education
portal has been pivotal in enhancing the standard of medical practice, education
and research by strengthening the post graduate medical education and continued
medical education. It works complimentary to the existing medical education system
of the country. Through its network, it provides medical education far and wide
with the click of a mouse, irrespective of the geographical location of the delivery
point.
Objectives of Medvarsity
- To complement existing education system for the health care providers.
- To strengthen basic conceptual foundation of the undergraduates, postgraduates and other HCP.
- To apply information technology tools and computer based solutions for the simplification of complex subjects, to facilitate the learning process across the network of delivery points spread over in the entire country. Hence, obviating the need for geographical relocation of the professionals.
- To resource, store and forward a range of medical information for the benefit of HCP.
- To undertake and encourage research in the development of new information technology tools relevant to medical education and its virtual delivery.
- To research and establish cost effective technology in health care for a wider distribution.
