New Delhi: Private hospitals are pushing for relaxation in norms to allow select facilities with 200 beds to start postgraduate (PG) courses in medicine, arguing that the move will bring down the shortage of specialist doctors in the country, ThePrint has learnt. The Association of Healthcare Providers of India (AHPI), in its recommendations to the Union ministry of health and family welfare and the Niti Aayog a week ago, has suggested opening at least four-five PG institutes to begin with. The AHPI has a network of 19,000 private health facilities in India, many of them corporate hospitals.
Nearly 1,200 of these hospitals have a capacity of more than 200 beds. As of now, no private facilities are permitted to offer standalone PG courses, though there are several government institutions doing so. “if we combine modern medicine and Ayush Ayush doctors, we are more than meeting the World Health Organisation norm of one doctor per 1,000 population.
But when it comes to availability of specialists, we have a huge shortage,” reads the report, ‘Towards A Healthy India: AHPI’s Blueprint for Change’, seen by ThePrint. India is known to have over 75 percent shortage of specialist doctors, it says, adding that a way to address this is to allow private health facilities with over 200 beds to start Doctor of Medicine (MD) and Master of Surgery (MS) courses. It, the AHPI says, will be a cost-effective way to fill the gap of specialists.
AHPI director general Girdhar J. Gyani tol.
