When you play with pseudoscience- one day we will become one.

The UGC under the direction of PMO has said yoga should be in PT curriculum.  Some time back there was talk we are part of AYUSH (the department of fairies for medicine) and some of the PTs also thought it is good idea.

Even though I think the idea of yoga in our curriculum should have come from some right wing nut, I also blame this on us. For the last 3-4 decade we have been running bachelor course and in the last 5 years every idiot with master’s degree (which most of them got it by not stepping into the collage) is doing or finished Phd (again most of them, without doing the actual thesis).  But we have not done anything to promote our worthiness as serious people of science. We have sporadic diligent people doing good work- shut down by other – and serious research. As noted earlier our MPT went from the toughest course to pass to the easiest course to pass in less than 5 years (well you don’t even have to come to collage what more to say) and we are using the same model for Phd.

The course done outside the college- those “workshops” are just flourishing which you would think would have made us all smarter. Well hell no one idiot is teaching the whole of India to put needles, other one is selling stickers and we have my perennial favorites- NDT (the treatment which never works but it cost 4 lakhs- when taught by vellakaran and 25 thousand when taught by your neighborhood Indian therapist). Add to this we are the growing market for the junk of the medical world like osteopathy and chiropractic (which I am pretty sure is illegal to practice in India) and experts in this crap (home grown and vellakaran).

Well all this leads to a big bullshit that is PT education today.  if you have any doubt search for sticker (k-tape), NDT, chiropractic and any other bullshit which is trough at us- the answer is always same- these are outdated science, these are not science these are not legible sentence will be the answerers. We have not promoted science, we have not promoted motor control, learning etc in neurology, and we have not promoted pain science in ortho and what we are left with people selling snake oil.

The newest threat to my beloved science is introducing yoga- not just the postures which are exercise but the philosophy – including study of Bhagavat Gita, Upanishads and what not.  Well happy to have known you all folks as PTs folks in the next few years we will be treating imaginary disease with imaginary breathing power. Come to think about it we are already doing it.

Love

K. Hariohm