Rajasthan Govt To Set Up Regulatory Body To Monitor Private Hospitals

JAIPUR, 6 MARCH 2019: In what would make the private hospitals fret and fume, the state government is planning to set up a regulatory authority for monitoring their activities, the fees they charge and the treatment they provide.

As of now, there is no Act or any government body in place, which keeps a check on the fees and the cost of treatment charged by the private hospitals.

In the past, the government has failed to implement the Clinical Establishment Act in its full spirit, which was passed in the state assembly in 2011 having provisions for monitoring the activities of private hospitals as it faced protests.

The Centre had enacted the Act for providing registration while regulating all clinical organisations in the country with a view to ensure minimum standards of facilities and services are provided to the patients. But it is still in the infancy as the only thing under the Act the government is doing is issuing temporary registration to clinical establishments.

Chief minister Ashok Gehlot on Tuesday announced to constitute the new regulatory body while inaugurating a 500-bedded government hospital attached to the Rajasthan University of Health Sciences (RUHS) medical college and a cancer care unit in Mahatma Gandhi medical college and hospital. He said there is a need for such a regulatory body for ensuring better healthcare facilities in the state.

“Sab kaam sarkar nahin kar sakti (government cannot do everything),” he said emphasising the role of private hospitals. “We (government) can set up a number of primary health centres, community health centres and other such establishments but there is a certain role that the private hospitals need to play to ensure better healthcare facilities,” said Gehlot.

He underlined that education and health sector cannot be exploited for generating excessive profits.

“Education and health are not a medium for making unlimited money but it is a medium of providing service to people. The government is expecting that the private hospitals should not only provide quality healthcare facilities but also ensure that the cost of treatment should be affordable for the patients,” he said.

Gehlot pointed out that they receive complaints regularly from patients of overcharged bills. For the same purpose, the government is planning to bring the regulatory body for private hospitals so that even the underprivileged patients get treatment in private hospitals.The Times Of India