Medical Corruption in India: Finding a cure!

On May 27th, 2012; Aamir Khan exposed the cancerous corruption in the Indian Medical Fraternity, in a country where doctors are treated as Gods, but in reality they are far from it.

They are corrupt, money minded and most doctors are far less bothered about treating their patients and mostly just interested in “treating” themselves to goodies from ill gotten riches by sucking their sucker patients. 

The whole profession suffers from multiple ills. 

Medical Schooling:

Crazily long and mostly irrelevant medical schooling leaves most doctors hungry and wanting for more as soon as they are considered “regulator-ily” ready to practise. Their contemporaries, engineering and MBA schoolmates of the same age have already started racking it in.

High Fees and corrupt intake practises:

Like most infrastructure in this country, medical schooling infrastructure has not kept pace with the rest of the country especially the birth rate!

India has among the lowest per capita doctors 0.7 for every 1000 people, and this is even lower than underdog economies  (Pakistan at 0.8,Vietnam at 1.2) and far from the developed economies (Spain at 4.9, Norway at 4.3 etc)

Moreover India produces 63800 MBBS doctors in a year, while its population grows by a whopping 2.54Cr. 50L students passing out from 12th fighting it out for the 64K seats every year, and isn’t it every parents dream to make their children a physician!

Any service or product, public or private suffers from issues of graft wherever demand far exceeds the supply and prices are fixed.

The only way for most people to acquire the medical seat is through payment of bribery and its hardly surprising that the same crop which comes out continues to behave in a corrupt manner. Not only is corruption an intrinsic “selection criteria”, the student doctors have to recover their investment which they have paid in graft as well.

Lack of regulatory Oversight!

Try this test. Who is the medical regulatory authority in India. Try answering this without asking google baba! If you are able to answer this question, give yourself a pat on your back, you are a rarity! So you try asking other people around you the same question and track how many are able to answer the question. Now ask the same question and replace India with US and don’t be surprised if success rate almost doubles up!

Think about this! More people (educated of course – since you are reading this), are aware about the medical regulatory body in US, who is doing nothing to save your ass. Think how little the Indian regulatory body is helping out then.

Regulators in India give new meaning to public-private-partnership

The biggest question mark for us is what do we do now! 

One solution is to wait for “acche din”, but despite 454 days from being sworn in as a prime minister, there have been no major policy changes and there has been absolutely nothing on the ground. Perhaps it is too early to expect results, or perhaps Modi is also ineffective, perhaps he is also corrupt or perhaps we have reached a stage where no one man can create any difference whatsoever on the ground for a long long time. I don’t which one, if any, of the above is the reason, but it is a fact that nothing on the ground has changed. 

So the only solution which I can think of is to empower yourself! Empower yourself with more data, with more analysis, with more comparison options, with more reading, to help yourself understand the medical jargon, classifications of ailments, their treatments.

Clearly it will be impossible to do so in the same manner as the even the Wikipedia

referring doctors who studied their way through 5 long years of medical study however ineffective it may be.

The other alternative is to use technology. Technology to help you do all of the above, compare treatment options, compare doctors and their track record, understand the symptoms and much more, all in order to empower yourself with the tools required to figure out the best option for yourself. The choice has to be yours. And it has to be an educated one.

I have no solution for the un-educated masses in India and I truly pity them for their lack of ability to leave this banana republic of ours. But for the rest of us, who can read and write perhaps technology can be the answer. 

BuzzPharma & Buzzhospitals are combining Technology and Medicine to bring this exact problem to an end and empower you to be able to make the right choice when you need medical help.

Buying a Used Car - Do's & Checks - Part 2

Now that you know the car that you are looking for and the approximate price you should pay, it’s time to look for your future car.

In the earlier days, I would go and meet the mechanics in my neighbourhood and tell them what I was looking for and they would put the word out and try and find something for me. Today, all I need to do is go and look up on a used car website and there are usually quite a few listings of the car that you are looking for.

The next thing you do is short-list the cars that you like based on colour, usage, price etc. and get in touch with the sellers. You can send them a message through the website or call them based on how they have chosen to be contacted.

Now remember – a thorough inspection of the car is a must. Don’t simply go on looks.

The best way to go about it is to ask your local mechanic to come along and help you inspect the car.

The most basic things to check on the outside are repainted surfaces and uneven gaps in the body panels. This almost certainly means the car has had an accident as the repair garages in most cases aren't able to align the body parts exactly like how it was when it was originally fitted. The gaps on the sides of the hood or trunk are the most telltale. If the gaps on both sides are not the same. You need to be careful.

Most city cars have their bumpers repainted due to scratches from bikes, other vehicles etc so that is acceptable, a car with original paint and a few scratches is still the best option because you know this is exactly the condition of the car and not a “done up for sale car”

JaanCar

Now pop the hood and the trunk. Check the crash beams behind the bumpers. These should not be bent or dented. This would mean the car has been involved in an accident and has been repaired. Check the seals on the insides of the bonnet and trunk edge. If the seals are original, it means that the car has not had any repairs done to the bodywork, another good sign.

One of the first things is do is check the tyres and then the odometer. The tyre wear should match the mileage. For example a car which is showing 30k kms should not have new tyres because you usually change the tyres at 50k kms conversely a car which shows 30k kms shouldn’t have completely worn tyres. This is another sign of odometer tampering, which is a very common problem in used cars and another deterrent to the uninitiated. 

More checks coming soon - Part 2 of 3

Facts about Generic Drugs

A Generic Drug is "a drug product that is comparable to a brand/reference

listed drug product in dosage form, strength, quality and performance characteristics, and intended use." As defined by Centre for Drug Evaluation and Research, U.S. FDA.

Generic Drugs are much cheaper than Branded Drugs, this is because the manufacturers of Generic Drugs, do not spend for the Research and Development of the Drug, nor do they spend for the clinical trials which are required to get any Drug approved for public Consumption.

India is the leading Manufacturer of Generic Drugs, due to the Patents Act passed in 1970, which removed Patents on the Composition of Food and Drugs, which allowed reverse – engineering of Branded Drugs to provide the world with low cost Generic Drugs. The Generic Drug industry is currently assessed at $15 Billion.

Indian made generic drugs have reduced the cost of medicines around the world, and major US and European Pharmaceutical Companies, have been lobbying their governments into changing what the Pharmaceutical giants consider attacks on their patents.  India and the EU are currently locked in a trade row over an EU ban, on 700 Indian Generic Drugs.

Globally, programs run by UNICEF, UNITAID, Doctors without Borders, all rely on quality Generic Drugs, which are a fraction of the cost which the Drug Companies that develop the drug charge. Most of these programs depend on the Indian Generic Drug Industry for their medical supplies to treat diseases and Conditions like TB, Malaria, HIV/AIDS, infectious diseases, in some of the poorest countries in world.

If you feel that you have been purchasing the more expensive Branded Drug, check the Generic Vs. Branded drug lists and prices that are available online. And you could purchase your next medication at a much cheaper cost.

http://www.buzzpharma.in/