Health

Even after Delhi high court pulled up the state government on the issue, few steps have been taken to curb the use of harmful chemicals at vegetable markets. ``The chemicals can cause gastric ulcer, liver problems and kidney failure. People must be careful and wash fruits and vegetables properly before use,'' said Dr M P Sharma of Rockland Hospital.

Experts said bottle gourd is often injected with chemical like oxytocin for faster growth that can cause abnormal growth and other complications in human beings.

``Fruits and vegetables are brought to Delhi from several parts of the country. To maintain their `freshness' and get a better deal out of them, suppliers and hawkers apply synthetic colours on vegetables and fruits which contain heavy metals like mercury and lead. Vendors and hawkers apply these colours particularly on vegetables like okra, beans and bitter gourd,'' said Sugriv Dubey. He filed a PIL in HC on the issue following which the court sought explanation from the government on Thursday.

Fruit sellers use chemicals like copper sulphate and calcium carbide to ripen bananas and mangoes. Sources added that in farms, pesticides and herbicides are used to excess to get better yield.

Source: Times OF India BY Durgesh Nandan Jha Chemicals used in fruits & veggies

The UP government, in February 2009, had made a reference to the state Law Commission to examine the matter and suggest a model draft bill for suitable legislation by the state legislature for registration and regulation of private clinical establishments.

The Law Commission, in November 2009, submitted the draft model bill "UP Private Clinical Establishments (registration and regulation) Bill". The commission in its report to the government said "private sector has emerged as a major provider of health services in India. With a view to control the sector on account of price, quality of service, unethical practices, it is recommended to evolve an effec tive regulatory mechanism".

"The Bill is likely to be intro duced in the state Assembly during s the winter session of the state legis lature," said Pradeep Shukla, the Principal Secretary, Health.

He said the Center has also re cently enacted a legislation for regu lation of private clinical establishments. "The Central act and the model draft bill submitted by the UP Law Commission are being exam ined and the final draft will be ready by the end of the year," said Shukla.

"In view of proliferation of such establishments and complaints re ceived from time to time about the quality of services provided by t them, it was felt that there was need for a legislation prescribing minimum standards for hospitals, nurs ing homes and other clinical estab lishments in the state," said an official of the UP Law Commission.

Source: The Indian Express New law for regulation of private clinics on anvil

Tests such as CT scans and MRI, meant for scanning seri- ous ailments, are presently available only in a handful of the Capital's government hos- pitals. According to the plan, the state health ministry will install CT scan machines in all of its 100-bedded and above hos- pitals and MRI machines in its 200-bedded and above hospi- tals in the city.

With this, these tests, which otherwise cost anywhere between Rs 3000 and Rs 10,000, will be available at less than half the price.

"It is ridiculous to see poor people running from one lab to another to get these expensive tests done. I want to ensure that no one visiting our hospitals has to leave the hospital premises and go out to conduct tests. This step is to ensure that. Also, most of them can't afford the amount private labs demand to conduct these tests," said Kiran Walia, state health minister.

"In some of our hospitals, an ultrasound costs under Rs 100.For these tests, we can charge an amount of Rs 500, which is much less than what private centres levy," said a source in the health ministry, requesting anonymity.

rhythma.kaul@hindustantimes.com   

Source: Hindustan Times By Rhythma Kaul At Govt Hospitals, Tests To Cost Less,CT Scan, MRI Facilites At Affordable Rates

The council has failed all but one hospital it reviewed as they couldn't pass its accreditation test.

The ` failures' include reputed institutions such as Lok Nayak Hospital, Deen Dayal Upadhyay ( DDU) Hospital and Guru Teg Bahadur ( GTB) Hospital, which bear a huge patient load not only from the Capital and the NCR but also from across the country.

Seven government hospitals reviewed by the QCI were tagged as " unfit" as they didn't meet even the lowest quality standards needed to acquire the accreditation.

Only the Geeta Colony- based Chacha Nehru Bal Chikitsalaya could get the QCI certification.

The council said Delhi's government hospitals were struggling to meet even the lowest healthcare standards. The quality of treatment provided by these hospitals was low, most had illequipped operation theatres and hospital infections were rampant, the QCI observed.

For the past two years, no government hospital -- save for Chacha Nehru Bal Chikitsalaya -- has been able to earn a quality certificate from the National Accreditation Board for Hospital and Healthcare Providers ( NABH), which is a constituent board of the QCI. The Delhi government approached the QCI two years ago when a programme was started to provide accreditation to the hospitals and medical institutions to maintain healthcare standards. The project was initiated by the then principal secretary Vivek Rae.

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" Hospitals have been unsuccessfully struggling to get a quality accreditation from us for the past two years. But it seems healthcare is not a priority for the government," QCI secretary general Dr Girdhar J. Gyani said.

Ironically, the Delhi government's health department had reviewed eight of its hospitals and ruled that they had the " potential to get the accreditation". These eight were Chacha Nehru Bal Chikitsalaya, Lok Nayak Hospital, GTB Hospital, DDU Hospital, G. B. Pant Hospital, Maulana Azad Medical College and Maulana Azad Dental College, Shri Dadadev Matri Avum Shishu Chikitsalaya and the Institute of Human Behaviour & Allied Sciences ( IHBAS).

Source: Mail Today By Neetu Chandra QCI Says Delhi Hospitals Fail To Clear Health test & Many Unfit To Provide Services

Needless to say, it has no air condi- tioning.

What it also does not have are sur- geons. (It's a hospital with a difference).

Noida also has branches of corpo- rate healthcare giants Max and Fortis, which do not suffer from asbestos roofs and whose air conditioning is robust.
And of course they have surgeons. Who charge at least Rs 400 per consultation.

Clearly, Noida's lesser-privileged class- es don't have many healthcare options.

But late as it has been in the coming, a change is appearing on the horizon.

OFF THE SICK BED?
Delhi's cousin is set to get two multi- specialty government hospitals. The first, in Noida sector 30 -- Bhim Rao Ambedkar multi-specialty hospital -- is a 300-bedded facility expected to come up by the end of this year.

"Our first section with 80 beds is complete and can be made fully func- tional anytime," says S.K. Srivastava, chief project engineer, Noida Authority.

Source: Hindustan Times Double Dose To Boost Noida, The Suburb Will Soon Get Specialised Low-Cost Hospitals

With a view to encouraging investment in hospitals in non-metro areas, the benefit of sub-section (11B) of section 80-IB had been extended last April to hospitals located anywhere in India, other than defined "excluded area". Sub-section (11B) of section 80-IB provides for a tax holiday for five consecutive assessment years, beginning from the initial assessment year, to an undertaking deriving profits from the business of operating and maintaining a hospital in a non-metro.

However, the finance minister announced on Thursday that the tax relief would also apply to `new' hospitals with over 100 beds in previously `excluded area' which includes the urban agglomerations of Greater Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bangalore and Ahmedabad, the districts of Faridabad, Gurgaon, Ghaziabad, Gautam Budh Nagar and Gandhinagar and the city of Secunderabad.

"Availability of modern hospitals is a priority area for the country and private sector participation is desirable in order to provide better healthcare facilities to citizens. Currently, hospitals (of more than 100-bed capacity) constructed in any area other than the "excluded area" are eligible for claiming hundred per cent deduction under section 80-IB (11C) of the Income Tax Act," finance minister Pranab Mukherjee said on Thursday. Considering the pressing need for more hospitals all over the country, it is proaposed to include the business of a new hospital anywhere in India, with at least one hundred beds for patients, as a `specific business' for availing the benefit of investment-linked deduction, he added. Tax benefit is now available to hospitals which are constructed and have started or would start functioning at any time during the period beginning the 1st day of April, 2008 and ending on the 31st day of March, 2013.

As a precursor, it has kicked off a massive exercise of iden- tifying locations where the heli- pads can be built.

Three helipads have been proposed between Gurgaon and Kishangarh (Rajasthan) on the National Highway No. 8 -- one in Haryana and two in Rajasthan.

Other national highways ema- nating from Delhi are NH-1 (meandering through Kundli, Sonepat), NH-2 (Faridabad), NH-10 (Bahadurgarh) and NH- 24 (Ghaziabad ).

Helipads would be set up at a distance of 100 kms on these high-speed roads.

Urban stretches such as Gurgaon Expressway that already have a number of good quality hospitals all along it have not been in- cluded in the plan, NHAI officials said.

sanjeev.ahuja@hindustantimes.com

Source: Hindustan Times By Sanjeev K. Ahuja Air-Ambulances: Flying To Your Rescue On Highwayss

Noble initiative: "Smile on Wheels" being flagged off by Batra Hospital and Medical Research Centre CEO Sanjeev Bagai in New Delhi on Thursday.

Smile Foundation, a national-level development organisation, on Thursday launched its second innovative mobile hospital in Delhi and the National Capital Region for providing comprehensive health care services to marginalised communities at their doorstep.

"Smile on Wheels" is a health care van that will provide medical treatment and check up to the needy, particularly children and women. A full-time doctor and para-medical staff will travel in a van equipped with electro-cardio gram and X-ray with dark room. The van will ply in Kalyanpuri, Khichripur, Trilokpuri and Dallupura areas of East Delhi and Noida.

Flagging off the van at the Constitution Club here, Batra Hospital and Medical Research Centre CEO Sanjeev Bagai pointed out that 80 per cent of the health care in our country is privately driven, 40 per cent of children under five years are malnourished and over a million deaths are reported annually. "In such a staggering scenario, the initiative by Smile Foundation will bridge the gap and help in facilitating affordable, accessible and accurate health care services to all sections of society."

"With a population of 1.2 billion people, providing health care services to every citizen is a Herculean task. We need more than 7 lakh beds in hospitals. Therefore, the government must work in partnership with private hospitals," said Dr. Bagai, a senior paediatrician.

Source: The Hindu By Madhur Tankha Health care for the needy at doorstep

For the last three months, not a single patient from below poverty line (BPL) has been treated at the Rockland Hospital.

When the special committee appointed by the High Court visited the hospital last month, only one out of the 11 beds available for BPL patients was occupied in the Pushpawati Singhania Hospital.

Noting that there is a `calculated, systematic nexus among government and private hospitals to successfully frustrate the court and cheat poor patients', the committee has recommended penalising medical superintendents of government hospitals if they do not refer patients to private centres.

In Delhi, 40 private hospitals allotted cheap or free land by government agencies are required to set aside a tenth of their beds for the poor even if they had not given any such commitment at the time of allotment. The High Court committee has come to the conclusion that over 90 per cent of these free beds remain unoccupied.

"Close to 1,000 beds in private hospitals are supposed to be used to unburden government hospitals and provide quality care to underprivileged patients," said Ashok Agarwal, a lawyer associated with Social Jurist, an NGO. "It is bizarre that some hospitals have not treated a BPL patient for as long as three months. Part of the blame is with the government, which does not pressure the private hospitals.
We're going to ask for a highlevel inquiry in this matter."

Source: The Indian Express By Vidya Krishnan  Private hospitals dodge `poor' clause, doors still shut to underprivileged

We will make use of free-SMS websites and inform parents through it.A.K. DHAWAN, Ghaziabad CMO

The Ghaziabad health department has now contemplated the full use of free-SMS services available through various websites to educate and inform the masses about polio vaccination dates and schedules in the district.

Badly hit by the polio virus in 2009, the district health department has now come up with the idea of a call centre at the MMG district hospital to educate, inform and update parents about the due dates of polio-vaccination and various schedules.

"The easiest way to connect to people nowadays is through mobile phones. We will send the schedule of the polio campaign and due dates of the vaccination for children," said said A.K.
Dhawan, Ghaziabad Chief Medical Officer (CMO).

"This program has been initiated at our own level," he added.

"Due to lack of funds, we will make use of free SMS websites and inform parents through it," said Dhawan.

The officials also intend to expand the program to the entire district.

Source: Hindustan Times By Peeyush Khandelwal Unique Connect: Now, A Health Campaign Through SMS

To be available in a month's time, the online facility will enable the department to keep track of monetary transactions between insurance companies and enlisted hospitals.

In addition to allowing beneficiaries to check their insurance amount and per entry usage, the system will also keep an update of all the hospitals empanelled under the scheme.

The Centrally-supported scheme was launched in April 2008. It provides health insurance to around 1 crore Below Poverty Line (BPL) families in the state.

As many as 8, 37,837 smart cards have been distributed in the state till now. The smart card cost beneficiaries Rs 30 annually and covers medical expenses up to Rs 30,000 for five members of the card holder's family. Having tied up with ICICI Lombard as the insurance agency, the Centre pays Rs 550 per month as premium for insurance in the scheme.

The scheme had all its monetary transactions and monitoring done online for the 15 districts which were covered under the scheme in the first phase till April 2009.

The records maintained by hospitals were, however, not available on the internet, making it difficult for departments to tally data provided by the insurance company.

Source: The Indian Express Health insurance plan for the poor set to go online

This is Delhi government's newest plan to make medical advice available to you at a minimum cost and maximum convenience.

"We are planning to have a call centre manned by about 5060 trained doctors and paramedics, who will be able to handle any basic health inquiry," said Kiran Walia, health minister of Delhi.

The Delhi government is planning to do it with the help of private players, who will be responsible for the infrastructure and maintenance, while the government will provide the manpower.

The government plans to have a common number for the call centre with a bank of lines. This will work like the ambulance and police helpline numbers, which work 24/7.

Delhi government is also hoping that this concept may help in building a community-wise database of patients, which may help health researchers.

Source: Hindustan Times Doctors on call, 24/7, and free

Invariably the doctors have been insisting that the patient have a complete blood profile, ultrasound and Xrays done and get urine tested, both routine and even culture sometimes.

No one has any objection in undergoing so many tests in cases of serious ailments but certainly the patients and their relatives do get upset when they are asked to go in for various tests in ordinary ailments such as common cold, viral fever or minor injuries or bruises. The question arises as to whether these tests, involving considerable expenditure, are at all necessary? The doctors' version in this regard is that they do not want to take risk of getting involved in any litigation, especially under the Consumer Protection Act, under which the consumers do not have to incur any expenditure by way of court fees. Another argument is that in order to prescribe scientific treatment, the requisite tests are essentially necessary.

Noticing the above unhealthy state of affairs, P. R. Subhash Chandran, a journalist of Andhra Pradesh, went to the extent of filing a writ petition pro bono publico before the Andhra Pradesh High Court seeking issue of directions to the government to prevent the exploitation of the patients undergoing per force numerous tests required by the doctors. The high court appreciated the stand of the petitioner but expressed its inability to issue directions to the state government, as sought for. It, however, observed that there was a definite need to control and check the unethical practices being followed by the doctors in the judgement reported at AIR 2000 A. P. 272.

The author is an advocate and editor of Consumer Protection And Trade Practices Journal ( CTJ)

Source: Mail Today By Rosy Kumar Doctors Must Not Exploit Patients' Trust

Mandatory registration of contract research organisations or clinical research organisations (CRO) should start in three months, said Surinder Singh, drugs controller general of India (DCGI).

"This is a very good move by the government," said Muralidharan Nair, partner, health sciences practice, at audit and consulting firm Ernst and Young. "In today's world, it (the existing system) gives a poor impression of India that anyone can have a CRO. The registry will allow people to know the strength of a CRO, the services it offers, its credentials and therapeutic segments it covers."

Such a registry, he said, was a basic requirement for the industry.

India is one of the fastestgrowing clinical research destinations with a growth rate that is two-and-a-half times that of the overall market growth, but human drug trials have so far not been monitored closely.

Source: Live Mint By Radhieka Pandeya TIGHTER REGULATIONS - Firms Have To Register With Govt For Clinical Trials On Humans

Rising obesity resulting in lifestyle-related disorders like diabetes and cardio vascular disease (CAVD) among the Asian Indian population has led to the revision of dietary guidelines by the Government of India.

The guidelines were last revised by the National Institute of Nutrition (NIN), Hyderabad, in 1998. The new ones were released in the Capital on Friday.

Diabetes Foundation of India, in collaboration with department of science and technology and National Foundation of Diabetes, Obesity and Cholesterol Disorders, formulated the India-specific guidelines to be published in a medical journal to create the necessary awareness.

Broadly established for two Indian regions -- north and south, the guidelines will in time be modified to suit the necessities of regional Indian population as well.

Source: Hindustan Times Charting the perfect Indian meal

Bed networking knowing how many beds are available in each hospital and referring patients accordingly will soon be a click away.

In a recent meeting with medical superintendents of private hospitals which had acquired land at concessional rates promising free treatment to BPL patients the state health officials instructed them to update the "bed vacancy" at the end of each working day on the website of Directorate of Health Services (DHS).

"The idea is to keep government hospitals informed about the bed vacancy in private hospitals," said JP Singh, Principal Secretary. "Most state-run hospitals are over-burdened as private players were not keeping up their end of the deal. We want government hospitals to start referring BPL patients to private hospitals as a routine," he said. The procedure of bed networking has already been worked out. As of now, private hospitals send a fax every morning with information about bed vacancy. This will be done online.

"With a click of mouse we will know which hospital is best suited for the patient, keeping in mind the location and the speciality required," said Dr Amit Banerjee, Medical Superintendent of Lok Nayak Hospital. The hospital is already referring seven to eight patients a day to private hospitals.

If this works as planned, it will mean that patients will no longer have to share beds, limiting cases of infections.

"This is a step towards a future where a poor patient will confidently walk in to a private clinic and be treated with dignity without paying a single paisa," Banerjee added.

The state government recently appointed a nodal officer exclusively for Indraprastha Apollo hospitals which had gone to court against paying for consumable to treat poor patients.

A doctor has been posted there for three months to ensure that 200 beds are kept aside for BPL patients.

Government officials here said the department has also directed all private hospitals and pathologies to conduct `elisa' test for dengue before confirming the disease.

Over two dozen dengue cases have been reported from different parts of the state so far.

Gone are the days when your Mediclaim policy covered only your hospitalisation expenses. You can now cover your visits to the doctor, medicine bills, diagnostic tests and maternity expenses as well.

This is due to increasing competition in the health insurance sector with the entry of five nonlife insurers and two stand-alone health insurance companies since 2007. All 21 life insurance players have also been allowed to offer health covers.

"We hope to see many more innovations in the health insurance sector, which is good for the insured," Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority chairman J. Hari Narayan told HT.

"We recently launched Easy Health Individual Insurance Plan that covers maternity expenses after six claim-free years and free health check-ups after three claim-free years," said Antony Jacob, CEO, Apollo DKV Health Insurance.

Source: Hindustan Times Now, pay for your root canal with insurance

"The government will soon recruit 5,000 doctors through Public Service Commission," Health Minister Anant Kumar Mishra said yesterday during a day-long training programme of newly appointed medical officer held here.

For the convenience of the newly appointed medical officers they are being appointed in their home district, the minister added.

"The main objective of training programme is to strengthen health services in the state and ensure that poor people who cannot afford treatment get benefitted,"he said.

"The government will extend all possible support but if any laxity is observed in providing health services to poor stern action will be taken against the guilty,"he warned.

The hospital authorities, however, denied the claims. "Not a single case on Friday warranted a test. We had stocked 30 kits for the sudden rush of people. We had been testing each visitor before the guidelines were formulated. As a result, we have temporarily run out of kits. We had written to the NICD, where we are sending the samples for testing, to send us some more kits. But, we have not yet received any response,'' said the CMO at the hospital.

A NICD official said instead of allotting kits to each hospital, it is being done centrally through the state government. "We have told Noida health officials to arrange the kits from Lucknow,'' said the official.

However, the district health officials assured that there was no reason to panic."We have taken all steps to tackle the problem. NICD officials have offered all help. In the interim we procured kits from medical vendors. By Thursday evening, we contacted Lucknow and the kits have now reached us,'' said the official.

Source: Times Of India Patients in Noida allege there are no kits at centre