Chandigarh approves Rs 6-crore proposal to begin evening OPDs in all UT dispensaries

According to Dr Suman Singh, Director, Health Services, Chandigarh, while the budget has been approved, once the department receives the funds, it will recruit staff on contract, including medical officers, pharmacists etc. The plan is to have the evening OPD in for a complete shift of six hours, with morning OPD timings being 8 am to 2 pm.

While the evening OPDs will improve healthcare services, the need of the hour, says a senior doctor, is to have more speciality services in these dispensaries and better infrastructure, with more medical facilities and staff, including paramedics, and nursing staff.

Also, GMSH-16 and the civil hospitals in Sector 21 and Mani Majra offer 24-hour emergency services. To cater to the increasing number of patients in GMSH-16, a proposal to the administration for a super-speciality block here has been sent, with facilities of cardiology, nephrology and neurology high on priority.

According to Singh, the idea of having speciality services here is to also decrease the hospital’s dependency on PGIMER, which is already overburdened with patients, and always facing a shortage of beds.

“We have to refer patients to the institute and GMCH-32 due to lack of speciality departments and that causes a delay in treatment and a lot of running around for patients,” she adds. A tender for a Cath Lab at GMSH-16 under the PPP mode has been floated to help patients seek specialised services at the hospital and reduce the burden on other hospitals.