Free health screening of children in the age group of 0-18 years registered in schools and Anganwadi centers will be performed under the National Child Health Programme.
Collector Thakur Ram Singh issued directives to the officers involved in the programme during the meeting of district level implementation committee held here on Tuesday. “Route chart should be defined for the health screening while doctors and other staff should be assigned the duties for the purpose. A systematic record of the medical examination of children should be maintained,” said Singh.
Chief Medical and Health Officer Dr KR Sonwani informed that free health screening of children (0-18 years) will be done under the programme. The doctors will examine the children for 30 diseases particularly birth defects, deficiencies, development delays, disability and other major disorders occurring in the age group.
The doctors will test for fever, headache, cough, vomiting, Diahorrea, anaemia, deficiency of vitamin A, visual disorder, etc and provide free treatment or refer to hospital according to need.Students will also be made health conscious and awareness will be generated about malnutrition, said Dr Sonwani. Dr Sonwani said that for effective implementation of the programme, two Chirayu teams have been constituted for each development block. Each team comprises of a lady doctor and male doctor besides a Pharmacist and an ANM.
The responsibility of screening of children between 0-6 months has been given to the concerned ANMs and Mitanins who visit homes. Screening of children from six weeks to 18 years will be done by Chirayu team. Children up to six years will be screened at their respective Anganwadi centers while children in the age group 6-18 years will be screened at their respective schools, ashrams and hostels.