Medical
Council of India stops use of animals for training UG medical students
The
Medical Council of India (MCI) has amended the education regulations for
medical colleges and universities by dissuading use of animals for training and
experimentation and pushing for modern non- animal teaching methods.
The
Gazette notification for the amendment states, "For teaching physiology
and pharmacology in UG curriculum, the required knowledge and skills should be
imparted by using computer-assisted modules."
Earlier
this year, the University Grants Commission had also sent notices to all
universities registered under them to stop animal dissection and
experimentation in zoology and life sciences courses, following a pending
official recommendation two years back.
These
initiatives and regulations have come about due to the result of animal welfare
organisations, such as People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), and
activists, such as Maneka Gandhi, who have been writing to these central
educational bodies for years against animal use in training students.
"This
is a tremendous victory for animals who will no longer be killed to teach
medical students when humane, non-animal teaching methods have proved to be
superior," said PETA India Science Policy Adviser Dr Chaitanya Koduri.
According
to PETA, nearly 97% of US medical schools, including Harvard, Stanford and
Yale, neither use any animals to train medical students nor require experience
with dissection for potential applicants.
Medical
universities in Maharashtra, on the other hand, claim animals are not being
used for any training purposes for years now. "With all the technology
that is available to us now, we don't require live animals for teaching.
Mannequins and models have been around for decades and we also have artificial
simulators which do the job. The phase-out of animals in medical schools has
already been implemented," said Dr Sudhir Deshmukh, dean of the medical
faculty at Maharashtra University of Health Sciences.
Bad treatment for spinal injury
could lead to paralysis
The rampant unauthorised and unproven stem cell transplant
for spinal cord injury can leave a person paralysed below the level of injury,
health experts said Thursday.
Issuing a statement to caution people about such practices
and create awareness on the issue, the Association of Spine Surgeons of India
(ASSI) said: ‘There is an urgent need to create awareness on the issue, and
advise the spinal cord injured and their families to make informed decisions
regarding the plethora of ‘effective’ stem transplant treatments being offered
across the world.’ ‘Over the past decade, various clinics in India and abroad
have started offering experimental treatments, often involving transplants of
stem cells, which are advertised as having beneficial effects, even though
there is little or no evidence supporting such claims,’ said ASSI president Ram
Chaddha.
He added these stem cells transplant procedures attempt to
establish credibility by citing experimental studies that have no direct
relation to the spinal cord injuries. Sajan Hegde, consultant spine surgeon at
Apollo Hospital who also heads its orthopaedics department, said the only
accurate way to determine that a treatment is beneficial is to carry a properly
designed study with an appropriate control group.
‘It is important to conduct valid clinical trials to
evaluate whether stem cell and cellular transplant can be offered as a valid
option after the spinal cord injury. Some properly conducted trials are now
being under taken, but it is advisable to wait for the results from these
objective studies,’ he said.
Source: http://health.india.com
25.04.2014
Kidney donation knows no boundaries!
Two women
Nazia Habib and Vimala Dwivedi broke all the shackles of caste, creed and
religion to see their husbands back on their foot and in pink of health. Both
were looking for a donor for their respective husbands and had lost all hope
for a matching kidney. Nazia’s husband Mohammad Shamim was on dialysis for the
last 2 years and was in dire need for a kidney transplant.
Nazia
wanted to help her husband, but she couldn’t donate her kidney to him as it did
not match his blood group. She reached Max Super Speciality Hospital in Saket
where she was informed about the possibility of kidney paired donation. Kidney
paired donation occurs when a living kidney donor is incompatible with the
recipient, and hence exchanges kidneys with another donor-recipient pair. Such
transplantation enables two incompatible recipients to receive healthy, more
compatible kidneys from each other?s relatives.
Patient
Ramesh Dwivedi, a government servant and a resident of Gorakhpur was on dialysis
since February 2013. His 40-year-old wife Vimala Devi, a home maker, readily
offered to donate her kidney to save her husband’s life, but couldn’t due to
blood group mismatch. On approaching Max Hospital’s Institute of Renal
Sciences, she found out about Nazia who had B+ blood group and could donate
kidneys to her husband. On the other hand, Vimala’s blood group and other
vitals matched with Nazia’s husband.
The team
led by Dr Dinesh Khullar and Dr Anant Kumar arranged a meeting of both the
families and educated them about the possibility of helping each other. On
April 9, the patients and donors were taken in for surgery. After about an
eight-hour long surgery, Ramesh was successfully implanted with Nazia’s kidney
and Mohd Shamim was implanted with Vimala’s kidney. Both the patients and
donors have been discharged.
‘Every
organ donated can save a life. In a year, approximately 2 lac new patients need
kidney transplantation in India, but only 5000 can actually manage a kidney
transplantation. Rest of the patients do not get treatment due to finances or
unavailability of donor. We all must consider donating our organs after death.
In case of unavailablity of deceased donors, the family members must not shy
away from donating their kidney’. ‘This sindoor that I apply on my forehead is
a precious gift given by Nazia. My husband owes his life to Nazia and she and
her family will always be close to us,’ Vimala said.
Source: http://health.india.com
25.04.2014
If you focus
on results, you will never change. If you focus on change, you will get results
Jack
Dixon
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