Dream or mirage?

 

On the days one feels low as a med student they remember their pre-NEET (National Eligibility cum Entrance Test) days. One remembers the hardships one bore to get to the point of being called a medical student and somehow these memories help one fight the hardships medical college brings.

The journey from being a NEET aspirant to becoming a medical student is a long and arduous one, filled with unhealthy competition, lack of friends, long hours of tuition and late nights. Basically, it provides an apt trailer to the horror movie called, “The life of a medical student.” But one still continues with the hope of seeing their dream turn into reality one day.

But what happens if the reality turns out to be a nightmare? As the line of difference between a national level competitive exam and phase 1 clinical trial melts away in the heat of elections, the average student becomes a guinea pig on whom experiments are performed against their will. As the standard of the examination approaches the standard of cleanliness in government hospitals one wonders which is more dangerous- having unclean wards or having undeserving doctors to work in them? With an increasing number of reservations, finding a seat in a government medical college, for a general (to be read as SU-Scheduled Unfortunate) becomes as difficult as making an intravenous channel in a neonate. And to add a chilly flavored icing to the cake, some people achieve impossible and unimaginable feats with the help of grace marks, like obtaining a grand total of 719 out of 720 in NEET UG.

Even if one does land up in a government medical college after all of this, does one really achieve the long-cherished dream? The answer is an unfortunate “no” for most people. Starting from the so-called clinically oriented question papers which are tailor made for torture, to the loneliness and toxicity of final year of medical college, the reality cannot be further from the utopian dream one learns to see in the preparation phase. And all these hardships lead to? Yet another exam with lesser seats, more reservations and a bigger syllabus. So the race to that utopian dream continues for some while for others it ends as the competition breaks them down turning them into the same toxic people they once hated.

How does one achieve one’s dream then? Well, the answer to this question lies in the fact that first the dream of a utopian Health Heaven needs to change. If anything, we are in a dystopian world now, and gone are the days when only hard work and dedication could make a difference. The students need to know this truth from the very beginning. The examination and evaluation system needs a long and strong pull, a pull that could change it, though not altogether. But the first baby step towards change is what matters and that comes only when everyone comes together to raise their voices against this broken system.

One also needs to remember that a doctor’s journey is a lonely one and probably the crowd and media will concentrate on more pressing matters than the mumbo-jumbo of NEET exams, UG or PG. But that should not silence the call for justice and the spirit to fight all adversities to make a change. So, medicos and aspirants, are you up for the challenge?