The National Medical Commission (NMC) has announced an amendment to its “Guidelines under Regulation 10 of the Establishment of New Medical Institutions, Starting of New Medical Courses, Increase of Seats for Existing Courses & Assessment and Rating Regulation 2023″ (UG-MSR 2023) and Regulation 19 of the Graduate Medical Education Regulations 2023. This amendment primarily revises the permissible percentage of non-medical teachers in several foundational departments within medical colleges.
Previously, medical institutions were permitted to appoint non-medical teachers to a maximum of 15% of the total posts in the departments of Anatomy, Physiology, and Biochemistry, provided that medical teachers were not available.
Under the new amendment, this percentage has been increased to 30%. Furthermore, the scope of departments where non-medical teachers can be appointed has been expanded to include Microbiology and Pharmacology, in addition to Anatomy, Physiology, and Biochemistry.
The revised regulation now stipulates:
“4. In the department of Anatomy, Physiology, Biochemistry, Microbiology, and Pharmacology, non-medical teachers may be appointed to the extent of 30% of the total number of posts in the department, subject to the non-availability of medical teachers. The above mentioned non-medical teachers and the Statistician in the department of Community Medicine should possess qualification in that particular subject from a recognised University as per requirements in Medical Institutions (Qualifications of Faculty) Regulations.”
This change is expected to provide greater flexibility to medical institutions in addressing faculty shortages in these crucial pre-clinical and para-clinical disciplines. It may also broaden the pool of qualified educators with specialized subject knowledge from non-medical backgrounds who can contribute to medical education, while maintaining the essential requirement of a qualification from a recognized university.