‘Over 4200 health institutions at various levels to be consolidated soon’
Jammu: Minister for Health and Medical Education, Sakeena Itoo, today informed the House that the District Hospital Rajouri will be shifted to some suitable place for public convenience.
The Minister was replying to a question raised by Javeed Iqbal Choudhary in the Legislative Assembly.
She said that the District Hospital Rajouri is congested and sans sufficient space to cater to the increasing patient inflow. She said that it ( hospital) shall be shifted to some suitable place for public convenience.
The Minister assured that the government is committed to providing better patient care to the general public and ensuring the upgradation of all health infrastructure. She said that the efforts are on to ensure timely filling up of vacancies in all the health institutions.
Sharing details regarding the manpower in Government Medical College Rajouri, the Minister said that the sanctioned strength of teaching faculty, CMOS, and LMOS at GMC Rajouri is 119 and staff in position is 55 while there are 64 vacant posts. She also informed the house that the sanctioned strength of non-gazetted staff is 415, of these, 293 is in position and 122 posts are vacant.
The Minister said that all vacant teaching faculty posts stand referred to J&KPSC for advertisement and selection of suitable candidates.
The Minister said that the vacant posts are regularly being filled up on an academic arrangement basis in order to meet the shortfall of faculty in each discipline in terms of SO 364 of 2020 dated 27.11.2020.
Regarding filling up of Non-Gazetted vacancies, the Minister informed that the matter is under active consideration of the Government.
Legislators; Er. Khurshid Ahmad, Arvand Gupta, Dr Shafi Ahmad Wani, Pawan Kumar Gupta, Ajaz Jan, Iftikhar Ahmad, Muzaffar Iqbal Khan and Shabir Ahmad Kullay raised supplementaries.
Meanwhile, Minister for Health and Medical Education, Sakeena Itoo, informed the House that the Government is working on consolidation of exiting healthcare facilities and more than 4200 health institutions at various Primary, Secondary and Tertiary level exist in J&K, as on date, adding that 554 NTPHC’s function across the Union Territory.
The Minister, while replying to a question raised by Showkat Hussain Ganie, informed that J&K is among the top achievers in health institution density in the country as per the report of Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India.
While replying to a question regarding upgradation of Kanjullar, Kaprin, Turkwangam and Sharatpora Sub Centres to Primary Health Centres (PHC), the Minister informed that no future creations and upgradations have been planned, as of now, which may be worked out once the austerity measures in terms of Government Order number 17-F of 2024 dated 15.01.2024 imposed by the Finance Department are withdrawn.
Sakeena Itoo also said that to fill the critical gaps, among other things, the department aims to strengthen the existing healthcare facility strictly as per IPHS norms, extend support to the common man seeking medical attention by developing a robust e-Sanjeevani, telemedicine facilities through a well-designed hub and spoke model.
The Minister mentioned that the Indian Public Health Standards (IPHS) are broadly the benchmarks for the creation and upgradation of healthcare facilities.
Earlier, IPHS 2012 were being used and now IPHS 2022 norms are in vogue, which is at present the broad document to be used for any future creation and upgradation of Health Institutions.
