MBBS doctors working as quacks: private practice by interns in Kerala medical colleges.

In the early 1990s I was working in a medical college hospital in Kerala as an intern or house surgeon. The house surgeon’s post, or internship, was a year-long, compulsory programme for all medical students after passing the gruelling MBBS degree course. It was a time in the professional life of a young trainee doctor where s/he would be directly involved in the care of patients with a degree of autonomy in clinical decision making. A prototypal internship programme saw an intern spending three months each in the core departments of medicine, surgery and obstetrics and gynaecology and in allied specialties such as paediatrics, ophthalmology and ear, nose and throat. Another important spell in the internship programme took these trainee doctors to a primary health centre for three months for a posting in “social and preventive medicine” or “SPM”.