Odisha to launch air health service for four remote districts today

BHUBANESWAR: The state is set to roll out a new health programme - the Mukhyamantri Bayu Swasthya Seva (CM's air health services) - to fly medical specialists in chartered planes to hospitals in four remote districts periodically. CM Naveen Patnaik is scheduled to flag off the first flight from the Biju Patnaik International Airport here on Monday.
Officials said the service will be offered, free of cost, to patients in Malkangiri, Nabarangpur, Kalahandi and Nuapada.On the inaugural day, a team from the SCB Medical College and Hospital, comprising Datteswar Hota (urologist), Satya Narayan Routray (cardiologist), Chitta Ranjan Panda (gastroenterologist) will be flown to Malkangiri.
The prospective patients have already been selected through tele-consultation held earlier.
A senior government official said the the new scheme will cater to people from the economically weaker sections, who were deprived of proper healthcare, owing to the reluctance of doctors to be posted in the remote districts because of their locational disadvantage.
Renowned specialists such as neurologists, nephrologists, cardiologists from medical colleges and corporate hospitals, mainly in Cuttack and Bhubaneswar, will be flown to the four district headquarters hospitals.
The infrastructure of these hospitals, including diagnostic facilities and operation theatres, have been created keeping in mind the specialised care. The doctors who will be flown in to do the procedures and consultations will return on the same day. For follow-up treatment, tele-medicines will be used in a big way. The capacity of paramedical and nursing staff members is being enhanced, the official said.
The district administrations will publicise the schedules of the specialists and screen the patients who will need their services.
The NITI Aayog's first-ever National Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) released recently has placed the four districts among the most deprived in the country.
While Odisha was ranked 9th worst among Indian states, Nabarangpur (59.32%), Malkangiri (58.71%) have the maximum percentage of poor among the 30 Odisha districts.
Similarly, availability of health care in Kalahandi and Nuapada remain a big challenge, efforts for a medical college in Kalahandi in past one decade is yet to bear fruits. While a private medical college opened in the district closed down within two years of it starting admission, works for a government medical college is under way.
The government would review the response and assess the needs elsewhere to expand the service in future, the government authorities said.
Odisha has been offering a place of posting-based incentive to doctors by dividing the hospitals into five categories: from V0, the least vulnerable hospitals, to V4 the most difficult ones, offering 100% extra pay to doctors posted in most difficult hospitals.
These categories are based on backwardness of the area, Left-wing extremism, road/train communication, social infrastructure and distance from the capital. Doctors working in V1 to V4 institutions get additional marks in postgraduate entrance examinations.