Budget 2000 Views Around Education and Upskilling for Medical Fraternity in India

The 2020 budget allocation for healthcare is perceptibly moderate with a vision of some good opportunities for the medical fraternities and some cons that need to be addressed. Views from Gerald Jaideep, CEO, Medvarsity Online Ltd.

The PPP model to deal with the shortage of doctors as proposed in the budget-2020 is going to be substantially beneficial to the Indian healthcare sector. The tie-up of medical colleges with district hospitals for increasing the number of doctors that provide care to the patients will enhance the overall quality of the Indian healthcare ecosystem as this will lead to a greater number of skilled doctors in the Indian medical fraternity.

The penetration of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) as mentioned in the budget is going to bring a revolutionary change in the operations at healthcare facilities. Incorporating technologies in the daily tasks like documentation and approval through all the levels of the hierarchy will help hospital facilities reduce the total time of the patient journey right from the admission to identification of the condition, treatment, and healing. This, in turn, is going to make a significant difference in the overall turnaround time and cost, which will prove to be beneficial to both – patients and the healthcare facilities.

On the nursing front, the ecosystem is going to observe overseas opportunities of jobs as a lot of European countries such as the UK need Indian nurses in their healthcare workforce. However, it is important to focus on educating nurses to overcome the language barrier that they face in foreign nations will need an action plan. Educating nurses in foreign languages will also help them to upskill as they will be able to take up career advancement courses in those languages.

While the budget allocation for healthcare is declared as an overpromised INR 69,000 crores, it’s imperative to have a proper plan of action to bring the necessary change in healthcare as targeted in the Ayushman Bharat campaign.

The budget also promises a viability gap funding for hospitals and medical colleges to provide doctors with more DNB and FNB courses under the NBE for bridging the skill-gap in the Indian medical fraternity. However, the funding misses on a stern action plan to produce results.

Online education degree is poised to get approval; however, it is still actionable only for the top 100 institutions due to which other online education organizations’ contribution to the evolution of healthcare will be limited.