Telangana govt aims to set up a medical college in every district

Hyderabad: With the aim of making medical education accessible even to remote areas, the state government on Thursday announced that it has decided to set up a medical college in every district. The government said that this decision will bring corporate-level medical care to people from all sections of society.

Realising the need for more medical professionals to provide better healthcare, the state government said that by setting up new colleges the number of medical seats will also increase significantly.

How it started

The government said that there were only five government medical colleges in the erstwhile united Andhra Pradesh, affiliated with the NTR Health University. After the formation of the state in 2014, Kaloji Narayana Rao Health University was established in the name of Prajakavi Kaloji at Warangal and all medical colleges of the state were affiliated with Kaloji University.

Since 2016, Kaloji University started taking admissions into medical, dental, ayurveda, homoeopathy, unani, naturopathy, nursing, physiotherapy, lab technician UG, PG courses and allied health sciences courses.

Significant increase in colleges and seats

At the time of the formation of the state, there were 2,950 MBBS seats in five government colleges and 15 private colleges. After the state's formation, the government established 21 new government colleges in nine years. Similarly, 13 new private colleges have been established in the state. Now the currently available seats have gone up to 3,690 in government medical colleges, and 4,525 in private colleges, totalling 8,215 MBBS, 2,832 PG and 138 super speciality seats in government and private colleges in the state.

With the establishment of new colleges, 5,265 MBBS seats, 1,649 seats in PG and 59 seats in the super speciality have increased. The government has sanctioned eight more government colleges this year in Mulugu, Narsampet, Yadadri, Maheswaram, Medak, Qudbullapur, Gadwal and Narayanapet. All eight medical colleges will start taking admissions starting next year.

Special focus on medical allied education

The construction of super speciality hospitals is being done by strengthening existing hospitals to provide better medical services to people in the state. In the same way, the government is providing better treatment to patients by purchasing state-of-the-art medical equipment for diagnosis and treatment, especially in heart and other kind of surgeries.

The government has also established cancer treatment and dialysis centres along with T diagnostic centres, operation theatres, ICU, palliative care, and critical care units. With the increase in medical technology in hospitals, the government has laid special emphasis on the use of modern medical machines as well as supporting doctors. There has been considerable innovation in technologies such as anaesthesia, operation theatre, cardiac and cardiovascular, renal dialysis and many more. The university has added admissions to 780 seats in 11 courses.

The government also raised nursing colleges instead of depending on other states for nursing services. Nursing colleges in the state have now reached 100. Besides, the university is taking admissions for 1,100 seats in 23 physiotherapy colleges and 735 seats in 20 lab technician colleges. It can be said that the foresight of the government that such degree courses will combine education with employment and develop ancillary medical services is commendable. The state government said that it is gaining recognition across the country by promoting medical education and expanding medical services.