Biomedical engineering suffers from a lack of cogency as a discipline.
HYDERABAD: From many decades, several young people have flocked to the discipline of engineering in Pakistan. Significant investments have been made over the past decades to enhance and enrich the nation’s science and engineering workforce by broadening participation in engineering or related fields. Thanks to these efforts, new disciplines of engineering, such as biomedical engineering and other related ones have emerged. The name itself describes a merging of medicine and engineering — which makes it a multidisciplinary field.
But even though it has been a few years since this discipline of engineering came to the fore in Pakistan, it still seems like there is a lack of planning strategies which causes disappointment among many students who opt for this field. Case in point: the fact that many graduates are not absorbed by the job market.
Biomedical engineering suffers from a lack of cogency as a discipline. The time has come to address this situation. The field should be given due attention by education reformers and the deans and chairmen of different engineering departments can play a tremendous role in salvaging the futures of biomedical engineers. Administrators can urge companies in Karachi, Lahore and other major cities of Pakistan to devise a job test and hire recent graduates with the help of the deans and chairmen of biomedical engineering departments of different universities. In addition, a liaison officer should be appointed in every biomedical engineering department at universities to help and support students to get internships in different companies. This liaison officer should also be responsible for organising workshops, seminars and symposiums by inviting healthcare firms to conduct lectures and training on using medical equipment in universities.
Engr Balach Hussain
Published in The Express Tribune, May 9th, 2014.
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