Bhubaneswar: While Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik is eagerly pushing 5 T (transparency, teamwork, technology, time and transformation) in Odisha's health sector, a Niti Aayog report released on Monday (Nov 18) reveals how the State is in dire need of an 'E' or 'Efficiency' as a building block in Odisha's health system.
The report observed "Recent external efficiency analyzes of public sector facilities in six states (Odisha, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh & Telangana, Madhya Pradesh and Tamil Nadu) reveal both major variations and gaps in efficiency. The study done by IHME and PHFI (2018) calculated the relative efficiency of a sample of public sector facilities in each state benchmarking against the highest performer."
The observation further added that if facilities were perfectly efficient then, even with the same inputs, Odisha could have provided on an average 58,812 additional outpatient visits in the District Hospitals and 10,335 more outpatients visit in the PHCs (primary Healthcare Centres).
The import of the observation is how for the lack of efficiency in Odisha's public health facilities, a whopping 69,147 patients were unable to avail public health services in the State.
The significant mention here is the total OPD (outpatient department) visits in the fiscal year 2019-20 (Up to Sept 2019) stood at a massive 1.82 crore. State headquarters Khurda district tops with 19.11 lakh OPD visits, followed by Cuttack (17.21lakh), Ganjam (14.64lakh) and Mayurbhanj (11.58 lakh), reveals the latest data with State Health Department.
As per health experts here, 'efficiency' turns a casualty in the State for the lack discipline and no proper scheduling of staffs in State hospitals.
Also, when CM Patnaik is in a disbursal mode sanctioning crores of funds for the tertiary health care (District Headquarter Hospitals) sector in the State, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, who jointly released the report with Niti Aayog VC Rajiv Kumar, observed “Primary healthcare is extremely important for all. India is in a very hopeful situation and is set to be an example for other countries."
But the primary healthcare sector in Odisha is in a shambles. And the 5T booster dose has been for the district hospitals.
Not only the primary healthcare sectors fail to function 24X7 in the State, but facilities there also lack the capacity to cater to the populace. For instance, in 2018, only 26 of 1,360 PHCs have 4-beds. In 2017, there were 37 PHCs with four beds.
Similarly, Odisha’s PHCs and CHCs in 2013 had in-position strength of doctors and specialists totalling 1,335. The in-position strength of doctors and specialists in 2016 dipped to around 1,313. In 2018, the in-position strength of doctors and specialists dipped further to 1,170.