Strengthening of Intensive Care Units (ICUs) and mother and child care in rural government hospitals, allocation of additional budgetary grants for government general hospitals, and use of artificial intelligence (AI) and telemedicine in hospitals that lack expertise. These are some of the key suggestions made by health experts and top doctors at a meeting convened on Friday by Health Minister Dinesh Gundu Rao.
The meeting was convened to gather suggestions on Karnataka’s initiatives towards improving the public healthcare system, ahead of the State budget to be presented next month. A pre-budget meeting on health is scheduled to be held with Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Saturday.
With most of the participants expressing the need to strengthen ICUs in government hospitals, the Minister said while there is no shortage of ICU beds in taluk and district hospitals there is paucity of manpower. “ICU beds are not being provided in some hospitals due to shortage of staff. We will work out measures to set this right,” he said.
C.N. Manjunath, director of Sri Jayadeva Institute of Cardiovascular Sciences and Research, suggested provision should be made for utilisation of at least 10% of MP and MLA grants to improve patient care in government hospitals and the health of people in their constituencies.
While some experts including Devi Shetty, chairman of Narayana Health, suggested starting nursing courses even in 100-bed hospitals at the taluk and district level (presently nursing courses are permitted only in hospitals with a bed capacity of 250 and above), representatives of private hospitals submitted a representation seeking revision of package rates under government health schemes.
S.P. Yoganna, president of Government Schemes Empanelled Private Hospitals Association, Karnataka, said while many diagnostic procedures (including angiogram) are not included in the health schemes, the existing procedure rates are not even enough to meet the actual costs.
R. Ravindra, director of Suguna Hospital, said to make ultrasound scanning more accessible it is necessary to train technicians to do the imaging.
Responding, Mr. Dinesh Gundu Rao said a proposal on revision of treatment procedure rates under the health schemes is before the government. He assured that he will discuss with the Chief Minister and take a decision on the rate revision soon.
