Amid the growing trend of specialist doctors quitting government service in Haryana over the past few years, the State government has now set up a three-member committee to “elicit and evaluate” the reasons for the high number of resignations.
“It has come to the notice that there is a rising trend of medical officers seeking VRS (Voluntary Retirement Scheme) from government services. It has been desired to conduct a study to ascertain the reasons for such high resignation of officers in the health department,” said a letter by Additional Chief Secretary, Health, G. Anupama. The committee comprises Brahmdeep, Chief Medical Officer, Jhajjar; Nishikant, Medical Officer; and Yogesh Mehta, Special Secretary, Health.
Dr. Brahmdeep said the committee has sought data on the number of doctors prematurely quitting the government service over the past years to analyse it and look for the reasons and offer recommendations. The committee will submit its report in four weeks’ time.
Terming the move, “too little, too late”, Haryana Civil Medical Services Association president Rajesh Khyalia told The Hindu that the trend existed for several years and the matter had been brought to the notice of the government several times. He blamed the high number of resignations on poor working conditions, inadequate salaries, work overload and lack of promotion opportunities, among other things.
“The doctors in government set-up are overburdened due to poor doctor- to-patient ratio. A physician in a government hospital attends around 250 patients daily, against the norm of 100 patients per day,” said Dr. Khyalia, Senior Medical Officer in Panchkula.
“The additional task of preparing medico-legal certificates, conducting post-mortems, attending to court hearings and VIP duties add to the work burden. Appointed as Medical Officers, a majority of the doctors retire as Senior Medical Officers with just one promotion in their entire career. Only 3-4% of them are promoted as Chief Medical Officers, the highest designation,” said Dr. Khyalia.
‘Lack of specialists’
He claimed that nearly half of the 400-odd specialists hired in the wake of COVID-19 outbreak had quit within a couple of months.
“The number of various specialists such as gynaecologists, paediatricians, anaesthesiologists and physicians in the State is less than half of the Indian Public Health Standards recommendations. Some districts don’t have a single specialist of a particular category and the patients are referred to other districts,” said Dr. Khyalia.
