Govt plan may hit poor hard

Govt plan may hit poor hard
Preetu Nair, TNN

PANAJI: Patients, including the economically backward, may have to pay for availing of radiology services in the two government hospitals
in
North Goa once this has been outsourced to a private partner. The tender’s terms and conditions reveal, “The tenderer who offers free services/minimum charges to patients below poverty line will be given preference.”

Further, Goa Medical
College’s radio-diagnosis students may not have 24x7 access to the facilities at the teaching and research institute because the same terms and conditions state, “PG students and faculty members of the department of radio-diagnosis will be allowed to work on facilities during mutually agreed hours for clinical and research work.”

However, health minister Vishwajit Rane said, “The services are free for people below the poverty line and those availing the Dayanand Social Security Scheme. But others will have to pay a nominal fee, which would be at least 60% less than the amount charged in private hospitals.”

The tender which was to be opened on February 19, has been cancelled. “There was a technical error, so we cancelled the tender and will now issue a fresh tender,” said Rane. He, however, did not comment on any change in the terms and conditions of the tender, but said that the students’ interests will be protected.

“It is a government decision as we have no money to purchase the equipment. It is not outsourcing of the department but of operations and a few technical staff. The doctor’s role will not change. This is done to bring in more efficiency,” Rane said.

But doctors and students at the GMC are worried as the successful tenderer “will have to arrange for the consultant radiologist, who is competent to analyze the reports and to guide post graduate students of the GMC, and skilled staff including technicians.” This, they believe, is a move to create a parallel department with private consultants.

The terms and conditions of the tender are such that those who can only provide facilities such as CT or MRI or radiology or pathology will not be considered and they “should have a minimum capital of Rs 50 crore with the expertise of running pathology and radiology facilities”.

The firm that is awarded the tender will have to provide a 64 slice CT scan machine and a high end colour Doppler unit of minimum 30,000 channels or higher machine with 4D capacity at GMC. Besides, they would have to provide a dedicated vascular laboratory with state of art DSA machinery and digital radiography X-ray at the TB hospital in Panaji.

At the district hospital in Mapusa, the tenderer would have to provide MRI scan, high end colour Doppler unit of minimum 30,000 channels and digital radiography X-ray. Besides, the terms and conditions also state that GMC will also provide the MRI machine to be managed by the successful tenderer. But when they bid they will have to submit a demand draft of Rs five lakh each to GMC and district hospital.

“We are following the same procedure followed at Madhya Pradesh government medical college. I had discussed the matter with the advisory council and the signing of MoU with the private party will be done after taking the doctors into confidence,” added Rane.

21 Feb 2009, The Times of India, Goa edition