To provide specialised care for pregnant women in remote areas, the State government is considering converting some primary health centres into sophisticated delivery points.
Talking to The Hindu , Health Minister U.T. Khader said the need of the latter was felt after the deaths of pregnant woman due to lack of better facilities. These PHCs will have all the latest treatment facilities and trained personnel and they will be located 15 km outside radius of urban area.
Mr. Khader said they will be going for study to identify the PHCs that need to be converted into sophisticated delivery points. “We are discussing this. It is yet to come in the form of a proposal,” Mr. Khader said.
Mr. Khader made reference to this idea during the meeting to review health programmes in Dakshina Kannada held on Tuesday evening.
A representative of a private maternity hospital highlighted absence of certain facilities. This included a lack of blood bank which made it difficult to attend to high risk pregnancy cases.
One such case was that of Chanchalakshi (29) from Punjalkatte, who died on February 6 following an unpredictable complication. The Minister was also told about the death of 28-year-old Sumati while she was being moved from the Puttur Government Hospital to a private hospital in Deralakatte, Mangalore.
Mr. Khader directed District Health Officer H.S. Shivakumar to ensure that all private hospitals have facilities necessary for delivery.
Mr. Khader said he proposed to have three beds and five beds for high risk pregnancy respectively at each of the Taluk government and District government hospital in the State. Private hospitals were proposed to have four beds, he said.
