Essay Example on Medical University Improves Life Expectancy of Rural Areas

Health is among the significant basic needs of every person. Good health is hard to come across in rural areas, especially in developing counties. It is, therefore, essential to make health facilities and education accessible to these rural areas. A medical university would, in this case, provide health solutions to the residents of the area and in doing so, impact on their lives in many positive ways.

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One of the positivity is the improvement of life expectancy of those residing near the medical hospital. Having access to health facilities would contribute to this as it prevents unnecessary deaths. Deaths in rural areas have often been credited to the lack of hospitals near the victims (Jamison, Breman, Measham, Alleyne, Claeson, Evans & Musgrove, 2006). This makes getting to the hospital difficult and tiresome for a patient. A medical university in a rural place would help bridge these gaps making emergencies easier to deal with and save more lives. Apart from that, there is Control and prevention of some diseases which is hard in rural areas since hospitals are few.

Nonetheless, the available hospitals do not have the required facilities to treat some of these diseases, thus affecting patients. This distance makes it challenging to educate the people on how illnesses are spread, controlled, and even prevented. A medical university in a rural area would teach and also provide immunizations of certain diseases to the residents.

The problem of inadequate human resource in existing hospitals in rural areas would be addressed. That is a few hospitals in rural areas are often understaffed since most practicing specialists prefer working in urban areas. Graduating students from the medical universities would fill these vacancies making health provision in these hospitals better and effective (Harber & Davies, 2005). This also aid in the exposure of students in the university to patient cases that they may not come across in other medical schools. This helps expand their knowledge and experience. A specialty hospital may not be accessible to the patient due to geographical reasons. Establishment of a medical university will attract patients with different cases for the students to study and treat. At the end of the study, students will be well equipped and ready to treat various patients due to the experience they will have gathered with time.

However, such an institution would face some challenges in the provision of its services. The universities remote location would affect its running in many ways. Transport to these areas is mostly deficient, making it hard to access the facility. Patients having emergency cases may not be able to access them on time. A good example is that of an expectant mother about to deliver. She may end up giving birth at home under poor conditions since reaching the facility would take time. It would also make it expensive for students to commute from their residence to the university thus late to handle most of the cases. This may lead to the death of some patients if their claim is an emergency.

Residents in rural areas are mostly poor and not covered by health insurance. This makes provision of health services to them hard since they will not be able to pay for the services rendered. Drugs are often expensive, and these residents may not afford them. This, therefore, makes running of these facilities expensive since they mostly rely on support from the government.

From the above context, therefore, one can conclude that it is vital to establish medical universities in rural areas as they not only benefit the residents but the students too. They help bring quality health services closer to rural residents. It is also a platform through which these students gather experience and become better doctors in the future.

References

Jamison, D. T., Breman, J. G., Measham, A. R., Alleyne, G., Claeson, M., Evans, D. B & Musgrove, P. (Eds.). (2006). Disease control priorities in developing countries. The World Bank. https://doi.org/10.1596/978-0-8213-6179-5

Harber, C., & Davies, L. (2005). School management and effectiveness in developing countries: The post-bureaucratic school. A&C Black.