Two more private hospitals here — Sitaram Bhartia in Qutab Institutional Area and Jivodaya Hospital at Ashok Vihar — have been identified and added to the list of 43 hospitals that provide free treatment to patients belonging to the economically weaker sections of society.
While Sitaram Bhartia Hospital will provide seven free beds, Jivodaya Hospital will provide four free beds for the EWS category as per the latest order.
The private hospitals on the list have to provide free treatment to the extent of 10 per cent of in-patients department and 25 per cent of out-patient department. With this latest addition, the number of such private hospitals in Delhi has gone up to 45, said Delhi High Court-constituted monitoring committee member Ashok Agarwal.
“As per the rule, EWS patients from any part of the country are entitled to totally free medical treatment provided the family income per month does not exceed to Rs.7,020. No documentary proof of the income is required at the time of admission,’’ he added.
Availability
The availability of free beds, critical as well as non-critical, is displayed on the Delhi Government website and EWS patients are entitled to be treated completely free of cost.
“This includes cost of admission, bed, treatment, surgery, etc., including consumables and non-consumables and investigation in these identified private hospitals on being referred. The identified hospitals too are required to submit a regular weekly report on the patients from the weaker sections of the society who have been treated under the scheme and the idea is to ensure that there is maximum utilisation of the free beds for the benefit of the poorer section of the society,” said a senior health official of the Delhi Government.
Admitting that patients from the EWS category still find it tough to find treatment at private hospitals, the official said; “We have complaints about adequate and timely medical care not being provided to patients, which is an area of concern but we are working at correcting the situation by having a strict mechanism for checking the compliance of providing free reserved beds to the patients from the economically weaker sections in private hospitals.”
