Pvt hospitals to be roped in to conduct heart surgeries

Coimbatore, Aug 20 (UNI) Tamil Nadu Health Minister K K S S Ramachandran today said the state government was planning to rope in private hospitals to clear the huge waiting list of patients registered to undergo heart surgeries in government hositals under various schemes for the poor.

The health department was working out the modalities in this regard, he told newspersons here after visting the Coimbatore Medical College (CMC) hospital.

A mass programme involving school children was being devised to sensitise people about Chikungunya, he said, adding that no Chikungunya deaths have been reported so far in the state.

Stating that MRI scan machines would be provided at all medical college hospitals, he said the government was planning to establish a "society for hospital beneficiaries," with the district college as its head and other local industrialists and social workers as members to oversee the requirements of government hositals. As Health Minister alone cannot review all the hospitals in the state, this society would meet once in a month and recommend to the government about its requirements, he added.

All the sanctioned posts of doctors would be filled in the government hospitals within a month he said and added that there would be no scarcity of medicines in the government hospitals. The government had allocated additional Rs 32 crore for the purchase of medicines and also increased the budgetary allocation for the health department to Rs 300 crore.

He said all efforts were being made to bring the treatment facilities in government medical college hospitals on par with the private hospitals.

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