Undergraduate Medical Student's Orientation on Patient's Right in Healthcare Services

Health is already being known and practiced as one of the fundamental rights of the human being around the world. WHO constitution was the first to state the right to health as a fundamental right for every human being that should be enjoyed by every citizen of a country up to the highest attainable standard irrespective of race, religion, political belief, economic and social condition. The laws of Bangladesh do not deal with any definite rights to the patient. Here the patients' rights are indirect rights. "Right to life" (Article 32) is mentioned in the constitution of Bangladesh as a basic human right. Bangladesh Medical and Dental Council (BMDC) has guidelines about doctors' duties and rights, but it does not have any section for patients' rights. Medical colleges in Bangladesh teach students about health rights in 3rd year MBBS course of Forensic Medicine. This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted from January 2020 to June 2020 at the Department of Forensic Medicine, Sylhet Women's Medical College, Sylhet, Bangladesh. This study was undertaken to assess the knowledge of and attitudes towards patient's rights among undergraduate students and assess the effects of the ongoing medical education process on it. This is a descriptive cross-sectional study conducted over first 6 months of the year 2020 at the Department of Forensic Medicine, Sylhet Women's Medical College, Sylhet, Bangladesh. Questionnaire was pre-tested and necessary research approval was taken from ethical committee. Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS), version 20, was used to analyze the data; significance was considered at p<0.5.A total of 162 medical students of third- and fourth-year participated voluntarily in this study. This study demonstrated that 67.28% of total attended students had adequate knowledge of patient's rights. This study showed the positive effect of the ongoing medical education system on students' knowledge of patients' rights, during study of syllabus in our medical education system.