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BMC goes into e-teaching mode

Excellent infrastructure and outstanding alumni are the hallmarks of the Bangalore Medical College, which has just turned 50, says RASHEED KAPPAN

KNOWLEDGE POWER: Students busy with their research at the BMC digital laboratory. — Photo: Murali Kumar K.

HOLDING ALOFT the noble tradition of imparting medical education, the Bangalore Medical College has just turned 50. For five decades, the college has produced big names galore in the medical fraternity, built up a reputation for medical practice and achieved much more to add muscle and meaning to the glitter of the golden jubilee year celebrations.

Fifty years ago, when Bangalore had only a medical school, the BMC made its entry into the city. Initially started as a private medical college by the Mysore Medical Education Society, the institution was handed over to the then Government of Mysore. Five decades later, the college is a reputed institution taking in about 150 students each year for the MBBS course, 70 for postgraduate degree and 65 for postgraduate diploma courses.

Superspeciality courses were introduced in the 1970s. Later came the post-doctoral fellowship courses in specialities such as Gastro-enterology and Vitreo-retinal surgery.

The postgraduate courses were started in the Sixties and Seventies. Now affiliated to the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS), the college has so far produced about 7,000 graduates.

Attached to BMC are the Victoria Hospital and the Bowring and Lady Curzon Hospitals, the Vanivilas Hospital and the Children's Hospital, the Minto Ophthalmic Hospital, now upgraded into a Regional Institute of Opthalmology, the SDS Sanatorium, the Isolation Hospital and the Venkateshwara ENT Institute besides the Mental Hospital. The last was the early version of the now famous National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (NIMHANS).

This kind of clinical facilities, says an old student, are not easily available to most medical colleges. "This is a veritable goldmine for the diligent student. This also perhaps explains why a large number of graduates from BMC have excelled all over the world."

In the last five decades, the college has produced a rich array of doctors now spread across the globe.

K.M. Srinivasa Gowda, former Registrar of RGUHS, an ex-student and the organising secretary of the BMC Golden Jubilee Celebrations Committee, gives us a run through of the who's who of former students.

Who's who

"T.K. Sreepada Rao is a nephrologist who treated Jayaprakash Narayan and M.G. Ramachandran. A. Sampath Kumar is considered to be among the top ten cardiothoracic and vascular surgeons in the country. Udaya Bhanu Surya Prakash is the first non-American to be elected president of the Association of Chest Physicians of America in its more than 100 years history."

There is more: "H. Sudarshan has won the Right Livelihood Award (the alternate Nobel Prize). Gerard Aranha was handpicked to operate on Cardinal Bernardine of Chicago and is now the director of the centre named after him. Dinakar Rai has invented many surgical techniques in venous surgery. Ballal is the Vice-Chancellor of MAHE."

Incidentally, the Director of NIMHANS, the Vice-Chancellor of RGUHS, and the Directors of Indira Gandhi Institute of Child Health, Minto Regional Institute of Ophthalmology, Sanjay Gandhi Accident Hospital, Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Chest Diseases and Sri Jayadeva Institute of Cardiology are all BMC alumni.

In the first few batches, 50 per cent of the students paid a small donation while the other half were selected on the basis of merit by the Government of Mysore. B.K. Narayana Rao served as the college's first Principal.

For the sake of knowledge

Preparations for the college's golden jubilee had begun as early as 2000. Planning the big jubilee, the BMC Alumni Association wanted to bring together the old students on a common platform to renew contacts.

The plans got bigger and culminated in the Association donating a state-of-the-art digital library and seminar hall complex at an approximate cost of Rs. 3 crore. The Association's initiative was guided by a strong feeling among the old students to "give something back" to the institution.

The BMC alumni has now proposed to form a trust whose aims and objectives will be to constantly help in upgrading the infrastructure of BMC and to reduce the burden on the State Government.

But BMC would not have taken birth without the vision of a group of people who founded the Mysore Medical Education Society. And the first stated objective of the society: "To promote medical education and in particular, to found schools and colleges of medicine and surgery and other allied institutions."

Among the people behind the Society were a retired senior surgeon of the Government of Mysore, Rajasevasaktha B.K. Narayana Rao; a retired director of hospitals, Shastravaidyapravina T. Seshachalam; the then director of the Indian Institute of Science, M.S. Thacker; retired Mysore High Court judge, T. Singaravelu Mudaliar, and an ophthalmic surgeon from Bangalore, Mohammed Shafi Mehkri.

The digital library is designed to be a repository of knowledge as well as a "vehicle" with worldwide high-speed connectivity. "In keeping with the open source and the free access movement sweeping the scientific world, this `vehicle' will enable the users of the library to harness the available information to become world class professionals," explains K. Lakshman, a key person of the alumni.

The whole library building is "wired." The digital library has a server and 50 nodes networked through cables to all parts of the building.

Information from the server or nodes can be accessed from anywhere in the building. In addition, Wi-Fi `transmitters' are placed, one each in the library and the seminar hall. This facilitates users with wi-fi enabled laptops to access the server and the internet.

So, here's what users can look out for at the library: Access full text articles from journals, theses from the college, material in teaching CDs and multimedia presentations.

They could also access material stores in other libraries at NIMHANS, RGUHS and more.

Dr. Lakshman says hook-ups with more libraries will be developed soon. Users could also produce high quality presentations using a standard presentation with graphics.

The telemedicine facility will have a high quality video conferencing equipment with a fast satellite-based connectivity provided by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). Three ISDN lines will be put in place, ensuring a minimum of 384 kbps connectivity. "This will enable good quality, two-way, video and audio to be transmitted. Multipoint connectivity will be provided later."

This equipment is networked with the seminar hall, and its LCD projector and audio system, so that the audience can witness the broadcast.

"BMC can receive teaching material that is going to be broadcast using the EDUSAT satellite launched by ISRO recently."

The concept of "e-teaching" is expected to get a big boost with the digital library and the telemedicine facility.

Here's how: "BMC can hook up with any institution with the telemedicine facility, and transmit their classes to the outside institution or receive a `class' from that institution. Doctors from BMC can provide tele-consultation to people in remote areas."