With many posts of professors in the super speciality and speciality departments of government medical colleges in the State lying vacant or unqualified persons leading departments, patient care is suffering. Also, with MCI norms not fulfilled, undergraduate and post-graduate seats are being removed or de-recognised or no additional seats are allowed.
Poor and needy patients requiring services of branches like cardiology, urology, neurosurgery etc. are suffering because they cannot afford expensive treatment in a private hospital.
Some of the senior faculty have been waiting for elevation for a long time. Assistant Professors in super specialities are stagnated because there are very few posts of Associate Professors. If Associate Professors become Professors after meeting the requirement of completing four years of tenure as Associate Professor, some posts of Professors remain vacant because there is not adequate number of Associate Professors who completed four years of service in that post.
This problem can be rectified only by increasing the number of posts of Associate Professor on a par or more than the posts of Professor, the aggrieved doctors feel.
One example of the problem is the neurosurgery departments in AP medical colleges, which have just three posts of Associate Professor for 12 posts of Professor by the designated day (June 2). Thus only three assistant professors can become Associate Professors and later Professors. After State was bifurcated AP has just one post of Associate Professor and the AMC/KGH has just one Professor of Neurosurgery.
There are no Associate Professors meeting the four-year service criteria to fill the posts of Professors at Kakinada, Guntur, Vijayawada, Tirupati and Kurnool government medical colleges and general hospitals.
To overcome this problem the aggrieved Assistant Professors suggest that the Government to give notional promotion to all Assistant Professors who have five years of mandatory teaching experience. While this is an immediate solution increasing the number of Associate Professors on a par with the posts of Professors is the permanent solution, the doctors said.
