Ahmedabad civil hospital

Ahmedabad, April 15: The Narendra Modi regime has drawn up a plan to upgrade healthcare for the common man by targeting national accreditation for all state-run hospitals and medical colleges by 2010.

As a first step, two government hospitals will get accreditation within three months, said health minister Jaynarayan Vyas.

He said Gujarat had become the first state in the country to have signed an agreement with the Quality Council of India for upgrading healthcare standards. The National Accreditation Board for Hospitals and Healthcare Providers (NABH), an arm of the council, has begun inspecting hospitals and suggesting ways of improving standards so they can get the quality certificate.

Vyas said that by the end of the year, eight other hospitals and a medical college, where facilities are being upgraded, would get national accreditation, changing the face of the long-neglected public health sector in the state. The minister is optimistic that all 26 civil hospitals and six medical colleges in Gujarat will be accredited by 2010.

So far, only a dozen private hospitals across the country have got national accreditation. Among them are the B.M. Birla Heart Research Centre in Calcutta, Narayana Hrudayalaya in Bangalore, Max in New Delhi and Kerala Institute of Medical Sciences in Thiruvananthapuram.

A team from the accreditation board recently inspected three Gujarat government hospitals — in Junagadh, Narmada and Godhra.

The Godhra civil hospital will have to wait for accreditation as the team has pointed out certain gaps in the facilities on offer and asked it to fill them within six months, a senior health official said. The ones in Junagadh and Narmada have been asked to get more staff within three months.

For instance, an 80-bed hospital like the one in Rajpipla in Narmada requires 16 specialists, 20 general doctors and 136 nurses. Until now, it had only five specialists, 19 other doctors and 50 nurses. The team has given the hospital three months to recruit the required number of staff.

After signing the agreement with the council, the state has initiated a pilot project to upgrade the Gandhinagar, Sola, Mehsana, Valsad, Bhuj, Junagadh, Narmada, Godhra and Rajkot medical colleges.

The government has hired consultancy services firm Astron to work with the council and prepare the hospitals for accreditation.

The Astron study has found that government hospitals in Gujarat do not have proper signs or public address systems, updated medical records, latest equipment, advanced fire safety or infection control methods, or smooth patient traffic. The blood banks at the hospitals also need to be restructured.

The government says all this will change by 2010 when state-run healthcare will be on a par with corporate hospitals.

Under the action plan being drawn up, in-house training will be provided to hospital staff. Hospitals will enter into public-private partnerships with surgeons and specialists to fulfil staff requirements. Peripheral services such as biomedical waste disposal, laundry, catering and housework will be outsourced to increase efficiency.

A hospital has to meet 10 norms relating to patient care, infection control, information management systems, safety, medication, instruments, licences, training of staff and documentation.