Indians in medicine?

[Emmet2301]

I was wondering why there seems to be so many Indians in medicine. Is this true or just a stereotype? Also has this affected any of you guys about going into medicine?

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[dggopal]

well it is a stereotype but stereotypes are born from stretching the truth... nevertheless back to your querry... being an Indian I would say it has something to do with the cultural ideology that higher education should be persued in either Engineering or Medicine... Old school indian feel that those two fields are the only two fields... catch my drift...

 

[arshputhota]

Yes i agree wid dggopal...thinking like an indian i would say engineering and medicine are the only two fields that speak out to other indian ppl that you are educated

take my sis for instance - she did her engineering. and me, (my mom always wanted me to become a doc) but i kept fighting it..but now i just got intrested in it...but still since my sis did her engineering ever since i completed my high school my mom had been wanting me to go to med school

-archy

 

[dggopal]

apparently this isn't ur first post archy.... lookin at ur post towards the left hand side it says you have 2 posts to your name... what are you tryna pull here eh?

 

[arshputhota]

apparently this isn't ur first post archy.... lookin at ur post towards the left hand side it says you have 2 posts to your name... what are you tryna pull here eh?

yooo i aint kidding...right afta i typed this thread...i jumped on this otha thread n put up something else...lol..u cudnt even figure that out?...


-archy

 

[dggopal]

haha... sneaky sneaky eh.....

 

[arshputhota]

haha... sneaky sneaky eh.....

 

[Emmet2301]

Has this "fact" affected any of you in deciding to go into medicine or just affected you in general?

 

[dggopal]

well im sure when ur a kid and ur parents and all are basically reinforcing that doctors and engineers are respected and make a lot of money and that you should grow up and become one, you get a little influenced.... but I mean I suppose once you go to high school and such you would have enough of your own input to persue whatever you want to... at the end of the day though the "fact" does introduce that possibility to you... ya know.. at a very young age... and so it does predispose you to those two fields as opposed to telling a child... well you can be whatever you want to be.... cuz when we are growing up as indian children we are stressed upon the importance of math and science.... and we do really well in those subjects later... but then english and history for example arent stressed as much so perhaps a field in Law is less accessible to us later on... ya know...

 

[arshputhota]

i think hez perfectly right..all indian parents stress math and science during childhood which i think just sticks to you..and your nurture always effects the decisions you make no matter how much you think it wont.

-archy

 

[$!n!$+er]

which type of Indian are you talking about? resident or non restident?

India still has one of the worst doctoratient ratio in the world so clearly there are few doctors compared to general population.

 

[OneoftheGuptas]

well, sinister, i think you need to compare the amount of doctors and engineers in india to the number of people in india with degrees, rather than the whole population... in a country like india, where the majority of its population is living in rural areas, you wont really get an accurate picture with that type of comparison..

im studying in bangalore, and can name 4 medical colleges just off the top of my head, all within a radius of less than 50 kilometers. and thats excluding the smaller or newer colleges.. sounds like a buttload of med students to me!

 

[OneoftheGuptas]

and thats not even considering the amount of doctors that study in india and go abroad to practice.. (hence, the stereotype)

 

[dggopal]

I'm talking about all indians resident and non resident... and your point about the doctor patient ratio comments more on India's population than it does on the number of medical grads... im sure anwhere the population is over a billion people there would be a high patient to doctor ratio.

Graduates of medical schools in India represent a significant number of the international medical graduates practicing medicine in the United States. During the ten-year period 1993 — 2002, ECFMG issued Standard ECFMG Certificates to 18,493 graduates of medical schools in India. India represents the country with the highest number of medical schools listed in the International Medical Education Directory (IMED) maintained by the Foundation for Advancement of International Medical Education and Research (FAIMER). Therefore it is obvious that more indians want to pursue medicine otherwise there would be no need to have sooo many colleges now would there....

 

[$!n!$+er]

I don't know whether I'm missing the point here but, I honestly think there is nothing like "excess of doctors" situation here in India. Number of medical graduates coming out of medical schools is going to be high in absolute terms when you consider the fact that every sixth person on this planet is an Indian. Problem is that many of these doctors who usually come from urban upper middle class (and that includes most of you or your parents when they decided to go to the US) emigrate to the west and when you see someone just like you fighting for same career opportunities one tends to think, 'saala bahot brown doctors ho gaye yaar.' the US visa restrictions permits only the affluent and proffessional Indians to emigrate which creates somewhat distorted stereotypes about Indians being only docs and techies. Thing are changing here in India rapidly, the upper middle class domination of government run med colleges is coming to an end, more and more rural underpreviliged students are making it to med colleges. These people tend to stay back in India more, not because love for the country but for the want of money to go abroad. Demand for med education as compared against demand for an MBA from affluent middle class has gone down somewhat. For those still interested in medicine now have luxury of buying themselves med degrees thro' multitude of commercial enterprises as someone has correctly noted in previous post about situation in Banglore. There is now even talk of Reliance industries opening a chain of medical colleges just like the Reliance Fresh supermarkets. Medical education is still a lucrative business in India.

 

[dggopal]

k so I'm not sure I have completely understood ur last post but I'm guessing what you are trying to say is that the reason we feel that there are a lot of indian docs in america is cuz all the people applying to medical college in india are looking to go abroad and most of those that apply to indian medical colleges are from affluent familes that have the means to send their kids abroad... well... I agree that a lottt of people do become doctors for this reason in india... BUT I would have to disagree with your statement that most or all of them do... I mean I don't have any figures to back this up but just by looking at the street where I live I can see 5 private clinics where doctors are practicing everyday... I don't see 5 lawers offices in my street... so thats why I think that India IS saturated with docs... its like pharmacies over here... theres one on every street corner... if not more than one... they are everywhere just like doctors clinics here... EVERYWHERE>.. now in terms of coming to america I would think today... It would be a better bet to go into MBA or IT to go abroad seeing as how most of the IT companies sponser indians on H1 visas and MBA grads are always hired by MNC's and taken abroad... where as a doc you personally have to struggle with exams like the USMLE's and such to get into the states... I would think its easier to go the MBA route to go to america... no?

and I don't think everybody here wants to leave to go abroad... most people will agree that India is a very nice place to live IF you have MONEY... Doctors here can earn upwards of 2 lakhs a month... I think that is a very comfortable living dont you... I mean in america even doctors have a tough time affording maids to come everyday and cooks to come evry day ya know... Life in india isnt so bad... you got your own butlers and cooks... and if you live in the right cities you can have anything you ever want really... so dunno about that idea...

 

[$!n!$+er]

As you have pointed out correctly, there is excess of doctors in Indian 'cities', it is not unsual find 10 doc offices standing side by side on a given street. Like everything in India, this one end of extreme. There are whole 'mohallas' - precincts of hospitals in some cities. There' a huge chasm in number of doctor available per unit population in rural and urban India. The ratio is very much skewed in favour of the later.
As for MBA, US universities put lot of emphasis on students having a couple of years experience before they accept them to their programmes. This is something which usually doesn't really fit into linear relationship of completing one's education first and then getting a job so deeply engrained in mindsets of Indian student. This is sometimes necessary, because almost always parents are paying for education of their child eg., i'm 24 and graduated from medical college but i'm still living off my father's money. And, evem this picture is changing in India. Now that we have more and more banks offering cheap education loans, student's are becoming independent of parents in financing their education. Doing MBA with all its lucre is very much 'in thing' these days in India, even doctors are giving MBA a second thought. A recent report in a Mumbai newspaper reported 300% rise in application for CAT this year against 54% decline in MH-CET applications. It's not just that they are applying for CAT/SNAP/XAT but a lot of them are taking GMAT. I have littld doubt there as many if not greater number of people taking GMAT as there those taking USMLE here in India. Medicine as a doorway to upward mobility for Indian middle class is fast losing its appeal.
And as for, finding domestic help I would just like to say that manpower is dirt cheap here. There are no labour laws, no tribunals to redress exploitation for people employed in unorganised jobs such as domestic help. Life of poors in India is very cheap.
To live hassle free, good life in India needs lot of money. And, you can't earn lot of money in India without getting your hands dirty. That is why finding domestic help is least of worries for those willing to emigrate. Its rather a non issue for them.
I've been a bit incoherent putting down my thoughts but I hope you get geist of my argument.

 

[dggopal]

hmmm... You do bring up a valid point that there is a dearth of medical professionals in the "villages" of india... but i guess there is a dearth of everything there... thus the whole village status... hah... but seriously speaking I think that is the case in all countries... including America... we in america don't have superspecialty hospitals in every town big and small... I mean if I'm a neurosurgeon, I don't want to live in the middle of nowhere... I don't HAVE to live in the middle of nowhere... It is more lucrative to live in a city... and so I will live in a city... Now the only reason why this concept isn't realised in America that major hospitals are in the bigger cities... is because we have very good infrastructure... in terms of roads and connectivity between cities... This translates into easy access to medical care even if you are in the rurals.... for example... in india traveling 20km is pretty far and takes about an hour in moderate city traffic... maybe more... now take that same distance in america and it takes a hell of a lot less time and its easier to travel too... you dont feel like you have climbed Mt. Everest at the end of your journey...
I guess your point about the general shift away from medicine and towards MBA was kinda agreeing with me.... I dunno... And I agree that a lot of people are opting for MBA these days... but again... I still think that many if not most Indians consider MBA NOT to be a professional course unless the degree is from IIM or some equally reputed institution... and to back that up is the fact that most MNC's and companies look for that big name on ur diploma... ya know... If i did my MBA from IIM it holds a lot more weight than if I did it from some unknown college... now with medicine that isn't totally the case.... I mean once you are a doctor nobody will ask you where you got ur degree from... for the most part... so in light of this I still think MBA is not as appealing here as it could be say in a few years when the institutions here garner some fame... I dunno maybe I'm wrong and they are already pretty well known... but I still think that today and more so 5 years ago... Medicine and IT were the way to go for all Indians... Yeah sure today it mayyyyy be CHANGING... not yet changed... but still changing.... towards MBA and others.... but I still think that Indians today are pretty geared towards going into Medicine and Engineering... I mean another way to look at it is in terms of Donation or fees amounts.... I don'nt know what the going rate for a seat in an MBA school is but a seat at KIMS or Ramaiah or any good indian medical college is in the area of 75 lakhs.... that figure is so high because of demand....when i joined in 2003 the donation amount was 30 lakhs... now its more than doubled... so I would say demand for the medical profession has gone up... otherwise why would the price?

 

[$!n!$+er]

Rural or urban, India still has far worse doctor : population ratio. That is a fact and there no point contesting it. Emigration is only worsening the problem. By that I don't necessarily codemn those who have left the country. Right now 42 from my batch of 120 is in US, 2 have gone to Australia and one to Canada that is more than 1/3 of my batchmates.

Specialists are going to be based around urban areas but problem is that rural areas are not even getting MBBS grads. I'm currently working with a telemedicine company and I've seen enough villages with population in excess 4000 - 5000 without a single allopathic doctor to attend.

As for the MBAs, even IIMs do not feature in global top 100. With a booming economy India has opened up a huge market for absorbing the management grads from all tiers of B-schools. On the contrary Indian cos had to hire expats to fill the vacuum created at top tier management positions. So basically any qualification which can directly lead to gainful white collar employment will be deemed proffessional in current job market in India. Nobody gives two hoots to where did you get your degree from as long as you are competent enough to do the job.

Symbiosis most reputed of private sector B-schools in country ask for upward of 8 lakhs for its various TWO year MBA programmes. And that is hell lot of money for an average resident Indians. And management school doesn't even need fraction of investment required to run a five and half yr long MBBS programme. I don't know how much Symbi charges NRIs but it would certainly higher amount.

Private medical education does not really follow general trends in higher education in India. Majority of clientele of these colleges are moneybag NRIs like you or offsprings of established doctors or rich businessmen. For many of them MBBS/MD/MS are just trophy degrees.

 

[Lokhtar]

Parents pretty much coerce their kids into it. It's more than simply encouraging science/math, or there would be more pure science PhDs and math PhDs.

There is a very nasty undercurrent in our culture that you've only 'arrived' if your son/daughter is a doctor. It's doctors first, and everyone second. It's a ludicrous cultural trait, that while not universal, is still pervasive throughout much of the community.

Part of the reason is that back in the 70s, most people who were well off, had cars, etc were doctors. This is before the economy started opening up in the 90s and other equally or more lucrative careers started opening up. So if your parents were middle class, that's what you aspired to if you wanted to move up in the world: be a doctor. Unfortunately, that sentiment got intertwined with prestige, and it leads to several people in my family pretty much forcing their children to take up medicine even when they clearly want to do something like pure math, or archeology.