Siliguri, May 11: The Bengal government will enter a private-public partnership for improving services in North Bengal Medical College and Hospital (NBMCH). While new facilities will be introduced, old ones would be upgraded as part of the tie-up.

A proposal has also been made to increase the number of pay beds so that the revenue could be ploughed back into the hospital.

“The services would also have to be of standard quality, otherwise patients will not seek treatment here in exchange for payments,” urban development minister Asok Bhattacharya said here yesterday at a convention organised by the Junior Doctors’ Council and the Medical College Students’ Union. Bhattacharya is the chairman of the hospital’s patient welfare committee,

Quality service is one of the factors behind the decision to go for a tie-up on the lines of Calcutta Medical College and R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital. “MRI, CT scan and ultrasonography examinations would be some of the areas where such partnerships would be entered,” Bhattacharya said.

The minister also proposed that the junior doctors and medical students hold camps for patients and their relatives to inform them about the services available at NBMCH, a referral hospital for the six north Bengal districts.

The convention was attended by several private practitioners, voluntary organisations and medical representatives, who narrated several incidents that pointed to dalals (brokers) interfering and misleading the public.

For example, touts often take a patient’s family members coming from distant places like Cooch Behar to hotels for which they charge a commission. But the government has set up a hostel where relatives of patient’s admitted to NBMCH can stay for nominal charges. Many people are unaware of it.

Not only that, ambulance drivers, too, coax patients into going to private institutions alleging that the facilities at the hospital are not good.

“But that is not the case. Not many people know that pacemakers are being implanted in NBMCH. Right now, two or three such operations are being conducted a month, but the number can be increased 10 times,” said Udayan Ganguly, the principal of the college.

When junior doctors and students pointed out that a number of equipment in various departments had become inoperative, Bhattacharya said a list of such items was being prepared. “But I know for sure that optimum utilisation of existing infrastructure and equipment is not being done. The department heads should see that this does not happen and services improve.”