Union Minister of State for Health Bharati Pravin Pawar on Wednesday launched the National Emergency Life Support (NELS) courses for doctors, nurses and paramedics.
Apart from the training modules, the programme also includes developing training infrastructure in all States and Union Territories to implement the NELS course and creating a cadre of trainers to train doctors, nurses and paramedics working in emergency departments of the hospitals and ambulance services.
"Till now, healthcare professionals in the country had to rely on foreign modules and paid courses which were not only expensive but were also limited in scope to a handful of emergencies without considering needs and priorities of our population landscape", said Pawar while launching the course.
She added further, "Therefore, realising the Prime Minister's policy of 'Make in India' and 'Atmanirbhar Bharat', the NELS provides standardised curriculum which is based on Indian context and developed in India".
Talking about the National Health Policy of 2017, she said that it envisaged the creation of a unified emergency response system, linked to a dedicated universal access number, with a network of emergency care, provision of life support ambulances and trauma management centres.
"It is the need of the hour that India embarks on creating a world-class, efficient, professional and integrated system, enabled by technology, for the care of any victim of an accident, emergency or trauma in any part of the country", she added.
The health ministry has also requested the States to send proposals for establishing NELS Skill Centres at their medical colleges and urged all Skill Centres to ensure that trainings are not only operationalised but also utilised to the maximum extent to improve the quality of emergency care services in the State.
The activities under the NELS entail developing emergency life support training modules for doctors, nurses and paramedics after experts' consultations and based on the Indian context, setting up and equipping skill centres in medical colleges under the Centre and States to impart skill-based training on emergency life support for all categories of health functionaries.