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National Workshop on Accreditation and
Standardization of Health Services
9 February 2005, New Delhi
Keynote Address
Shri
P K Hota, Secretary, Dept. of Health & Family
Welfare, MOHFW, GOI
I would like to extend my warm welcome to you all
for coming together for this crucial workshop.
I wish you Mr. Sharma and your endeavor all success
and hope that this important workshop is able to evolve a meaningful dialogue
on quality issues facing the health sector in our country.
I would also like to place on record my deep
appreciation to Dr Habayeb, WHO Representative to
India, and Dr Agarwal, DGHS for inaugurating our
Workshop. Their vision, thought and advice reflected in their address would
definitely guide our deliberations in this workshop.
Friends, Accreditation of health services is a
complex area. In the health sector, there are too many variables with too
many players and factors, and the state of affairs is always in a dynamic
mode. Each development effort opens up new area of questions, standards and
training requirements. Accreditation requires keeping a check not only on the
doctors, but also the equipments, supplies, paramedics, waste management and
almost every complex area and variables.
During the last five
decades, considerable progress has been achieved in the promotion of the
health status of our people. Extensive networks of primary healthcare centers
and tertiary care institutions providing specialized curative services have
been developed.
Of the total current health expenditure of 5.2% of
GDP, more than 4% is contributed by private sector, the public health
expenditure being approximately 1 %. We are determined to raise
the public spending on health to at least 2-3% of the GDP over the next five
years, with focus on primary healthcare.
To realize the commitment enshrined in the National
Common Minimum Programme for improved public health
services, a National Rural Health Mission (2005-2012) is in the process of
being launched. The goals of National Rural Health Mission are to provide an
accredited social health activist in each village as a trained health worker.
The Mission proposes to provide 2,50,000 community
health activists as village level health providers in underserved areas. Over
2000 rural hospitals at the level of community health centers would be
upgraded to a uniform set of standards developed as Indian Public Health
Standards to benchmarks effective levels of service.
We are also taking steps to promote India as a
health care destination to attract persons from different parts of the world
to utilize the cost - effective health care expertise and infrastructure
available in India. India enjoys a competitive advantage at the international
level by virtue of its vast scientific manpower.
The rich heritage of traditional knowledge of
medicine from Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy is
an asset to my country. Majority of the rural populace of India are benefited
by these systems. In view of the global need for alternate therapies, the
Government of India has put in place a collaborative program to
scientifically validate these therapeutic modalities through a Golden
Triangle Partnership project.
The globalization process has brought in a spurt in
technological advances and emergence of new forms of business opportunities
and processes impacting a wide range of sector including healthcare. The
overall growth in trade in health services has resulted in increased
cross-border delivery of health services through movement of consumers.
However, grading of our health care institutes as per the agreed
international standards and standardized practices at country-level may
result in tapping the full potential to our advantage.
Like the Information Technology industry, India has
a comparative advantage in services like healthcare. The cost differentials
in healthcare between developed nations and India are reckoned to be even
higher than in the IT industry. But cost is only one of the drivers.
Sophisticated medical facilities in India can now draw people from the
neighboring countries. If this emerging potential is harnessed it could
shower unprecedented economic gains on the medical community and at least a
section of our society, in effect replicating the IT success story.
 India
could emerge as a major health care destination in the world on account of
certain inherent advantages like:
Availability
of good quality doctors
Ability
to provide state-of-the-art infrastructure
Dedicated
nurses and paramedics
Growth
popularity of traditional Indian System of Medicines such as Ayurveda
Ability
to render health care with a human touch.
The thrust is to promote the quality of health care
provided by India’s health care facilities. In this context, one of the means
to achieve higher standards in health care facilities could be by getting
accreditation as per the international standards. In fact setting up of
world-class health facilities in India would eventually raise the quality
standards of health care.
The process of globalisation
has also thrown open a number of challenges and opportunities before us. The
challenges are indeed formidable but these are also associated with
unprecedented opportunities. It is a matter of availing of them through
vision, focus and determination. I am sure that our health care facilities
would see an all round improvement in the coming years.
As I note from the programme
details, many important issues are going to be discussed. I hope that the
discussions would be extremely fruitful and lead to a better understanding of
the course to be adopted for improving health outcomes. We must think out
more meetings like todays, where large-scale
participation of appropriate stakeholders is there for meaningful deliberations
on such important and sensitive topics.
I urge our colleagues from States who are leaders in
their own rights, to translate these ideas in their own States. Some States
have gone ahead in starting an accreditation process. In fact the best States
always lead the Centre, so effort in this direction should also be
maintained.
Let us professionally work out all the details and
at the end of the deliberations have a set of recommendations which have to
be implemented, not alone by government, but all stakeholders. We should be
able to come out a series of follow-up meetings and detailed steps to achieve
our respective responsibilities in the process of accreditation.
From our side I have requested our Director General
Health Services, Dr. Agarwal who is our technical
head and an expert to head the process of accreditation for health services.
I would request all the leading medical associations to come forward and
participate in this process. I would request WHO and other development partners
to facilitate the process. I will discharge my role of seeing this very
important activity to reach its logical conclusion, or at least proceed
towards the logical conclusion.
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