NEW DELHI : The government is tapping the group of medical university students to conduct regular health checks at government schools to reduce the future burden of disease. This follows the direction of the Prime Minister’s Office after reviewing the areas of education and skills development.
The Union Health Ministry, together with the National Health Commission (NMC), directed all medical colleges to dispatch medical student teams to schools.
“The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) looked at education and skills development and one of the points of note for the school, education and literacy department under the heading of Education Policy Implementation. National education is the periodical health check and screening of children in schools. be done. Technology should be leveraged for this purpose. Students of medical and nursing colleges can be associated for this purpose,” Anita Karwal, secretary, school and literacy division of the ministry of education wrote to Health Minister Rajesh Bhushan, in a letter seen by the Mint.
Subsequently, Ashish Kumar Panda, Deputy Secretary at NMC wrote to the deans of all medical colleges, “Ask to send interns and PG students of your university to do the work. Health check of students whenever required by state government/UTs related authorities.
When contacted, an NMC official said: “It all depends on the state/UT how they plan the school physical exam for students. Our medical college students will help them whenever the respective state/UT health authority asks for such assistance. “
“We fully support this. We have a school health program going on across the country,” a Health Ministry official said.
Questions sent to spokespersons for the PMO and the health and education ministries on Tuesday morning remained unanswered.
Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman (PM POSHAN), formerly known as the Mid-Day Meal Program, is one of the flagship programs of the central government, covering approximately 118 million students in 1.12 million schools. . The program provides hot cooked meals to school children on all school days, with the goal of solving two main problems faced by children across India – hunger and education – by improving nutritional status of eligible children in government schools, by encouraging them to attend school more often and helping them focus on classroom activities.
The Ministry of Health has run the Rastriya Bal Swathya Karyakram (RBSK) together with the ministries of education and women and child development for children aged 0-6 and children attending grades 1-12 in public schools.
Dr Sanjeev Bagai, president of the Nephron Clinic and a pediatrician, notes that routine check-ups for children from an early age are an important aspect of preventive health care. “Annual health check-ups for children in school including height, weight, blood pressure, BMI, eye, dental and ENT and routine physical exams will help with early diagnosis and intervention. and prevent long-term problems later in life.”
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