PESHAWAR:
The Khyber Medical University has developed an Islamiat curriculum that focuses on medical ethics and may be introduced in the coming session this year.
“The previous course included only general topics regarding Islam and a few hadith and students were not taking an interest in it. It was one-way traffic as teachers were giving lectures and focusing more on theories than practical work,” KMU’s Vice-Chancellor Professor Dr Muhammad Hafeezullah said in an exclusive interview with The Express Tribune, explaining the need for reviewing the course.
The new course was developed by a panel of experts from different strata of life after three-year-long discussions. The panellists included Sindh Institute of Urology and Transplantation Karachi’s Dr Aamir Jafri and Dr Farhat Muazam, Islamia College University’s Islamiat lecturer Abdul Rashid, KMC’s Dr Zahid and the province’s chief khateeb Qari Rohullah Madni.
Dr Hafeezullah said that course contents of the revised curriculum concentrate on medical ethics, improving the relationship between doctors and patients, creating a sense of responsibility, prescribing inexpensive medicines and accepting voluntary duties especially at a time of natural tragedies and calamities.
He said that the revised course is student-teacher interactive in which students and teachers will discuss topics inside class and assign students to prepare assignments and lectures on it. “New graduates will be more humane while treating patients or dealing with their relatives. They will not use delaying tactics to aggravate infections,” he said.
All first and second year MBBS students, including those enrolled in the 19 medical colleges affiliated with the KMC, will be required to study the new curriculum. University authorities have trained Islamiat teachers and a two-day workshop was held on teaching methodology in May.
Some topics of the revised course are: purpose of Shariah and human health, importance of the field of medicine, characteristics of doctors, doctor-patient relations, curbing illicit medicine, patient’s consent in major medical decisions, role of doctors in natural disasters, responsibilities of doctors, job requisites in government hospitals, dealing with patients and their relatives, buying medicine and surgical instruments, issuing health certificates, prescribing expensive medicine, and health practitioners and society.
The VC said that in the second phase of revision of the curriculum, the university is planning to introduce similar courses for nursing students.
“Medicine is a sacred profession. We want to improve sense of responsibility among medical students and hence we have based our revisions over religious teachings.”
Dr Hafeezullah said that as the head of the prime medical university in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, it is his responsibility to change public opinion about doctors. “Most people feel that medical practitioners have failed to perform their duties.”
Published In The Express Tribune, June 8th, 2012.
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Very rare but some good things are happening around