‘Build specialty hospitals in taluk headquarters’

Legislators, senior bureaucrats should be told to get treated at government hospitals, says JD(S) MLA

N. Cheluvarayaswamy, Janata Dal (Secular) MLA, in the Legislative Assembly on Tuesday urged Health and Family Welfare Minister U.T. Khader to take steps to build specialty hospitals in taluk headquarters to treat serious ailments.

Legislators and senior bureaucrats should be told to get treated at government hospitals such as Victoria, K.C. General and Bowring and Lady Curzon, he said.

Participating in the demand for grants to the Health Department, he advised against frequent transfers of doctors, unless on corruption or misdemeanour charges. In taluk hospitals, maternity doctors and facilities should be provided for pregnant woman.

All primary health centres should be provided with a general practitioner and a specialist. All the doctors should be provided with quarters.

Mr. Cheluvarayaswamy said equal salary should be given to doctors from both allopathic and AYUSH streams. He said the discrimination in salary between teaching faculty and doctors serving in hospitals should be removed to get meritorious medical staff.

Citing the cleanliness and quality treatment provided to all patients at the State-owned Jayadeva Institute of Cardiology in the city, he asked why the same environment could not be created in other government hospitals.

Ramesh Kumar (Congress) and K.S. Puttannaiah (Independent) supported him when he said that the motto of nursing homes was to make money. The members suggested stringent laws to regulate nursing homes.

Mr. Puttannaiah wanted dialysis units installed in taluk hospitals at a cheaper rate.

Mr. Cheluvarayaswamy stressed on thorough streamlining of the office of the Drugs Controller.

Y.S.V. Datta (JD-S) and B.R. Patil (Karnataka Janata Party) urged that criminal action be initiated against 2,683 quacks detected in the State. He said they were harming patients by administering steroids.

He and Vishweshwara Hegde Kageri (BJP) said that enough stock of medicines should be kept to treat snake bites.

Aravind Limbavali (BJP) said that doctors should be recruited, including in areas coming under the Hyderabad Karnataka region.