Curriculum
Urban Training program
Training in Community Medicine begins from the very first year of MBBS and is a subject for all medical students till they finish their internship. The course is taught through theory classes, practical classes, family study, clinic-social case study, field visits, project work, seminars and tutorials.
Importance is given to participatory learning. During family study and field visits, students are taken to the community where they interact with the people to try and understand their health issues at the grass root level and the factors that have contributed to the same.
Urban Health Training Centers
The department has an urban Health Centre at Kamaraj Road which caters to surrounding slums covering a population of about 5000. The center provides free out patient service and free drug distribution. Patients needing inpatient care are brought to the college hospital. Regular health checkup and Health education camps are also conducted by the department.
Rural Health Training Centers
The college has adopted the Sarjapura Primary Health Care Centre as the Rural Health Training Centre. It caters to a population of 28,332 people and provides regular out patient care, 24 hours inpatient care with delivery facilities. The center has also implemented the various National Health Programmes in this area.
There are rural health training centres in Kalkunte and Mallasandra also catering to a population of 27,080 and 5,000 respectively. The interns and students together with the tutors and post graduates provide comprehensive health care to the community at these field practice areas.
Specialist Health Camps: Specialist health camps are conducted on a regular basis in the surrounding villages and urban slums of the college. A total of 30 camps have been conducted in the past year and 4,350 people have been screened for health problems at these camps. Fortnightly camps are also conducted at Sarjapura where on an average 200 patients are seen by specialists of various departments at Vydehi. Patient requiring further treatment are referred and treated for free at Vydehi.
Comprehensive School Health Programme: The department conducts regular school health programs where in all school children are evaluated for various health problems like visual abnormalities, vitamin deficiency, dental diseases, mental diseases and skin diseases. The children at these camps are given necessary intervention in the Vydehi Hospital. More than 10 government tools and six private schools have already been covered with this programme and a total of 3,874 children have been screened by interns and students of the college. Regular health education programmes are conducted during the follow up visits.
Specialist Health Camps
The college conducts specialist health camps on regular basis in its surrounding villages and urban slums. Fortnightly camps are conducted at Sarjapura where is on an average 200 patients are seen by the specialists of various departments in each visit. These patients are given free treatment and referral cases are treated free of cost at Vydehi Hospital. Camps are also conducted in over villages covering radius of up to 30 kilometers.
Undergraduate Training
Training in Community Medicine begins in the first year of the MBBS Course and continues up to third year. The course content is taught through theory classes, practical classes, Family Study, Clinico Social study, field visits and project work.
Undue importance is given to participatory learning. During family study and field visits, students are taken to the community where they interact with the people and try to understand their health problems at grass root level.
Post Graduate teachingPostgraduate teaching in Research Methodology and Biostatics is provided to the post graduate students of the institution. Post graduate training in Community Medicine has started since June 2008. There are regular seminars and journal club meetings every week. The post graduates are also posted to the rural health centers and the Urban Health Training Centre. They are also involved in the planning and organization of the health camps and the school health programmes.
