The Chhattisgarh Government has commenced the process of setting up a Medical College and a Teaching Hospital at Jagdalpur in Bastar district.
The Government will be seeking project management Consultancy for construction of the Medical College, Teaching hospital and allied buildings including campus infrastructure development, officials stated.
Notably, Chhattisgarh had one government Medical College established during the past two years with a capacity of 100 MBBS seats.
The Medical College was established in 2014-15 while no new government or private medical college had been established in the State during 2015-16, the Central government has informed.
To meet the shortfall of human resources/facilities in health sector, a Centrally Sponsored Scheme for establishment of new medical colleges by upgrading district/referral hospitals has been introduced with focus on underserved areas of the country.
A total of 58 districts under the scheme in 20 States/UTs have been identified.
As per the laid down procedure, Detailed Project Reports (DPRs) submitted by the State/UTs are required to be evaluated by a Technical Evaluation Committee (TEC) before they are approved by the Empowered Committee (EC). Implementation is to be carried out by the respective States/UTs.
In a major relief for students as well as parents, the Centre allowed increase of 50 MBBS seats at the Government Medical College in Raipur with the permission granted to start taking admissions for the seats in September this year.
With this, the total intake for admission to the MBBS course in the Raipur Medical College has gone upto 150.
The Centre’s decision was the result of the initiative taken by Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Raman Singh who had urged to increase the number of seats in the medical college for the benefit of the students, officials here informed.
Meanwhile, the Department of Health Research has launched a scheme for establishment of Model Rural Health Research Units (MRHRUs) for promoting rural health research. The scheme entails setting up of 15 MRHRUs during the 12th Plan period at a total cost of `67.67 crores.
Detailed guidelines have been formulated for establishment of MRHRUs. The scheme has a provision to provide non- recurring grant of `2.075 crore for construction of building and `1.00 crore for procurement of equipments.
Besides, recurring grant of `50.00 lakhs per annum is provisioned to meet expenditure on staffing, consumables, training, contingencies, etc.
So far, one MRHRU each have been sanctioned in 12 States, namely, Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Tripura, Karnataka, Punjab, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.
Chhattisgarh’s first Virology laboratory has been set up at late Bali Ram Kashyap Memorial Government Medical College, Jagdalpur in collaboration with the Central government.
Notably, prior to the establishment of such a Centre, patients had to go out of the State and pay a heavy amount for the treatment of the complicated diseases.
Dr US Paikra, the Medical Superintendent and VRDl laboratory In-Charge cum Head Dr D Majumdar said the facility was earlier restricted to the big cities of the nation.
According to the doctors, the treatment for Influenza, Bird Flu, Swine Flu and Dengue will also be carried out here.
The Centre was inspected by Bastar Division Health Service Joint Coordinator Dr RN Pandey.