bengaluru former union minister shashi tharoor on saturday urged medical professionals to acquire new skills to use sophisticated equipment to practice advanced medicine he was speaking at the 56th convocation of st johns medical college a simple degree in medicine won t be enough new technologies like ai for better diagnosis of an ailing patient and robotics for conducting surgical procedures have to be embraced along with it and computer skills medical colleges are producing graduates who are not wellequipped to tackle societys healthcare needs industrialisation and technological advancement have also adversely affected the environment and led to new lifestyle diseases so new challenges have emerged he opined he said theres a huge shortage of medical professionals particularly in rural areas many doctors prefer to stay in big cities he said in india there are only seven doctors for every 10000 patients and about 4 lakh more are needed to meet healthcare needs of citizens in the field of mental healthcare the ratio is 1 doctor for 13 lakh patients he added tharoor lauded st johns for its emphasis on helping the underprivileged he said theres a need to look at greater allocation of gdp towards health oswald cardinal gracias p resident catholic bishops conference of india was also present a total of 163 students were awarded degrees 59 mbbs 71 postgraduate 14 pg diploma 18 super specialty and 1 phd