Mangaluru: In a bid to fill vacancies of specialist doctors in government hospitals, the state health department will soon appoint retired doctors, who are willing to serve in public health centres across the state.
Minister for Health and Family Welfare U T Khader on Monday said that the deputy commissioners will be authorized to appoint retired specialist doctors aged between 60 and 65 years on contract basis in government hospitals in their jurisdictions in Karnataka.
He said that over 1,500 posts of specialists including gynecologists, aestheticians and pediatricians remain vacant in community health centres, general hospitals and district hospitals across Karnataka.
Retired gynecologists, aestheticians and pediatricians will be appointed on contract for a honorarium of Rs 50,000 per month. Meanwhile, if a retired specialist is willing to work on a case to case basis, then the department will use their services with a retainer payment of Rs 5,000 per month. Such doctors, will be eligible to get Rs 1,500 in case of caesarian operation for gynecologists, Rs 1,000 for aestheticians and Rs 500 for pediatricians. In addition, doctors, who are willing to work in outpatient departments, will be paid Rs 1,000 per day under Karnataka Health System Development and Reform Project, the minister said.
Radiologist call centre
The government is planning to start radiology telemedicine system, wherein radiologist call centre will be set up. This is aimed to overcome the shortage of radiologists in the State, the minister said. The technicians will be trained to scan patients in government hospitals and send the report online to the radiologists at the call centre. The radiologist in turn will give suggestions to the patients after going through the report,” he added.
198 new Ambulances
The Minister said the State government will upgrade its fleet of Arogya Kavacha ambulances by adding 198 more vehicles from Wednesday. Among them, 98 ambulances have been purchased with state budgetary allocations, while 100 ambulances are from the central government, which was sanctioned during the previous UPA government’s tenure.
Dakshina Kannada district will get 10 ambulances under the scheme. The ambulances will be placed at Talapady, Pumpwell, Mudipu, Natekal, Mani, Siddakatte, Sampaje, Haleyangadi, Kumbra and Kokkada. The Udupi district will get five ambulances for Hebri, Brahmavar, Baindur, Belman and Kaup.
Meeting
A meeting to discuss on how to improve the existing building of Wenlock hospital will be held on November 29. A team from the state will visit Wenlock hospital. A semi -ICU with 10 ventillators will be inaugurated on December 5. At the same time, a sewage treatment plant would come up at the hospital premises for the effective disposal of waste generated from the hospital.
