MMC Registration Renewal....What A Disgrace!

The Maharashtra Medical Council (MMC) has come up with a new law which states that every registered Medical Practitioner must accumulate credit points to the tune of 6 per year (30 in 5 years) for renewal of their registration, thus enabling them to practice legally. These points can come in the way of Continuing Medical Education (CME) Conferences, Publishing National and International Research Papers, Presentations and even Attending Conferences abroad.Since this law came into effect sometime last year, everyone was given a diktat to accumulate 12 points for renewal this year.

Fantastic Idea, some young Doctor's including myself said. It's worth it. We should keep in touch with new material for our patients. Yes, it was a good idea. But with every good idea that India has, we seem to have a bunch of coconuts running the show in the background. CME's are the backbone of a progressive medical society but the lacklustre MMC seems to have just copied the idea from the west for reasons only they know.

The result of having a good idea but poor execution is that suddenly there is a mad scramble from Doctor's to attend conferences. Any conferences that offer credit hours. It does not matter whether the topics are relevant or not. I could go to a dermat conference, gynaec conference, not have a clue on the latest techniques they use but still get my credit points to renew my registration.

 

Similarly, someone completely unrelated to the field of plastic surgery and robotic surgery could earn as much as 4 points for one conference by just attending it and playing on his/her phone all throughout the conference days and walk out a happier Doctor.

My question is, do you want a Doctor to be accredited only on the basis of attendance. Sounds a bit like nursery school to me. Attendance register, tick. Points, tick. Registration Renewed, Tick!

 

What they have to do it work out a solution wherein Doctors from their respective specialities attend those conferences that are relevant to them. Better still, start online CME's. With a 10 point multiple choice question answer session at the end. Not everyone has the time to close their practice and go for a conference for 2 days in a month. Some of us are still building a practice and need to be on call. This would be a boon for us. If the MMC could do this in partnership with someone, maybe a lot more Doctor's and patients could have more faith in them!

My next post will talk about the ordeal one goes through after the above is completed and you have to go to the MMC office to submit your documents for the renewal.