The Department of Health Research is planning to set up at least a few of the proposed multi-disciplinary research units (MRUs) in the medical colleges this year itself to promote research activities in the tertiary level healthcare institutions.

The proposal, which was originally planned for the 11th Plan, was not launched till now. However, it has finally been cleared by the Expenditure Finance Committee (EFC) recently and Rs.503.83 crore has been approved for the project that aims to set up 150 MRUs during the current Plan.

“It is expected to be rolled out sometime this year itself. The initial plan was to set up 150 units, but the EFC has approved only 80 medical colleges under the scheme,” sources in the Department said.

Medical colleges are the backbone of both teaching as well as providing specialized services to patients in India. It is also expected that medical colleges will also set the trends in thinking process and innovation to improve our understanding of the disease(s) and their management.

“Over the years it has been seen that majority of our medical colleges are just confining to routine patient care and also teaching based on conventional methods. This is thought to be basically because of lack of appropriate facilities and even lack of adequate attempt to create such new facilities e.g. modern biology units in the medical colleges. As a result, medical colleges even do not think of including the new methods of investigation for understanding the pathobiology, diagnosis, treatment and/or monitoring the progress of cases for better management practices,” an official explained.

The plan is to include at least all the government medical colleges under the scheme that will develop special infrastructure facilities. These units will provide the modern technology infrastructure which will improve the quality of the specialized care, training of doctors and other healthcare professionals and then research as per the needs of the population.

About sixty medical colleges have applied/been identified by State governments and these units are planned to be established in 2013-14 after completing the formalities. It is learnt the technical committee of the department has short-listed 31 medical colleges in 14 States.