(IN) US surgeon's new approach for medical schools

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http://www.timesofindia.com/today/21mban35.htm

 

The Times of India Online

Saturday

21 April 2001

 

US surgeon's new approach for medical schools

By S. Nandagopal

 

MANGALORE: Dr Jerry Vlasak from Trauma Centre, California and a fellow of

American College of Surgeons, who is a draw in over 100 medical schools in

US for his revolutionary and practical suggestions, will visit India, Sri

Lanka and Pakistan to talk on advances in medical education.

 

In a nut-shell, he is advocating that experiments on animals by medical

students should stop and be replaced with more modern techniques. His

lecture includes demonstrations of innovative new CD-ROMs, videodiscs and

instrumental programmes that are less expensive and more effective than

animal labs.

 

Dr Vlasak will ask medical schools in the sub-continent to follow Harvard

Medical School where first-year students observe human bypass surgeries

rather than learn the process by cutting up animals. His presentation

includes a documentary featuring Harvard's innovative `real world' lab.

 

Dr Vlasak advocates interactive computer technologies and surgical

simulators which will allow medical students to understand the effects of

drugs and invasive procedures by watching actual operating room footage or

working with lifelike dummies and computer-simulated patients.

 

The best way to learn about the human anatomy and on saving human lives is

by studying humans and not animals, states Dr Vlasak.

 

In the operating theatre, students watch real-life surgical procedures

recommend courses of action, administer drugs and do light surgical tasks

under the strict supervision of the surgeon on duty. A Harvard medical

student is quoted saying, that it was a privilege to learn hands-on in the

theatre, where someone was being given life, against experimenting the

procedure on an animal which ended in it dying.

 

Topline educators agree that use of animals for medical training is

counter-productive as it devalued life (the animals died following the

experiments) for those training to become life-savers. Besides, a dog's or

any other animal's physiology is different from a human's. Animals being the

guinea-pigs, several surgical procedures are performed on a single animal,

which does not augur well for those training to become doctors with

commitment and a heart.

 

Dr Vlasak says, more than half of the 126 medical schools in United States

have stopped using live animals in their physiology labs.

 

He is a member of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) a

Washington-based nonprofit organisation that promotes preventive medicine

through innovative programmes and encourages higher standards for ethics and

effectiveness in research.

 

Dr Vlasak is bringing his lecture to Bangalore, Chennai, Pondicherry,

Hyderabad, Calcutta, New Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Karachi and Colombo.

 

More information can be got on www.PCRMIndia.org.