In the news: Revamping medical regulation, neglect of pregnant patient in Mirzapur and more

States approve medical council overhaul

Planning body NITI Aayog’s proposal to replace the Medical Council of India with a National Medical Counil has been approved by a majority of states who have accepted the recommendations.

In a meeting chaired by NITI Aayog head vice-chairman Arvind Panagariya members from 20 states discussed revamping the medical council. One of the big changes proposed is for the body is to have a few members instead of just one chairman to oversee medical regulation in the country. The existing Medical Council of India has been tainted by scams and criticized by a parliamentary standing committee for being opaque and unprofessionally run.

Charges of medical negligence in UP government hospital

A man in Mirzapur district of Uttar Pradesh has alleged that his daughter-in-law and her child died to negligence by hospital staff.

According to the man, the pregnant daughter-in-law was taken to the Mirzapur District Hospital on September 4 where doctors didn’t attend to her for five hours. The family shofted the woman to a private facility for care but she was referred back to the district hospital on September 9.

The man alleged that he had to carry the pregnant woman himself from an autorickshaw into the emergency ward because there were no stretchers available, where again doctors delayed attending to the her.

Hospital authorities, however, dismissed the allegations of delay in care and said that the baby died even before the woman was operated on.

Delhi doctor arrested for raping patient

A doctor who runs a clinic in Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar was arrested for allegedly raping a patient last week. The doctor has been treating the complainant, a 24-year-old woman, for a throat infection for a few weeks. On Friday, the doctor called the woman to his clinic after working hours and raped her in the check-up room, according to news reports citing police sources.

The doctor also allegedly threatened the woman against telling anyone about the incident. The woman filed a complaint with the police immediately after. Charges of rape and criminal intimidation were filed against the doctor who was arrested on Saturday.

A multi-language dyslexia test

Scientists at the National Brain Research Centre at Manesar in Haryana have developed a new test to detect dyslexia in not just English but in Kannada, Marathi and Hindi as well. The test called the Dyslexia Assessment for Languages of India is for children between the ages of eight and ten.

Dyslexia is a learning characterized by difficulty in reading by a person with normal intelligence and is first seen in early school years. Between five percent and 20 percent of children around the world are dyslexic and researchers expect the incidence of dyslexia to be similar in India. However, it is tougher to detect with children being schooled in multiple languages.

The National Brain Research scientists in collaboration with other institutes that look at cognitive sciences, speech and hearing have develop a questionnaire to detect dyslexia and have tested the tool on 4,800 children from around India by checking a child’s ability to name pictures, identify words that rhyme, and distinguish the individual sounds that make up words, comprehend paragraphs, and use mathematical reasoning. They found that children who had problems with English were likely to have problems in understanding other languages too. It also showed the necessity to test a child in his or her dominant language since only 10 percent of those enrolled in school communicate only in English.