Health Minister V.S. Sivakumar has said that the new Medical College Hospital proposed to be set up at General Hospital, Manjeri, will begin functioning from next year.
He was speaking after inspecting the facilities being provided at General Hospital as part of its upgrade to medical college at Manjeri on Saturday.
Mr. Sivakumar said the new medical college would not be a referral hospital. A Janata Pharmacy at General Hospital would start functioning from next week.
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He said that among the four newly sanctioned medical colleges, Manjeri had better facilities than the other three. The recognition by the All India Medical Council and its Essentiality Certificate would be made available this year, he said.
He said postgraduate doctors of General Hospital would be allowed to continue when the hospital became a medical college. However, other doctors without postgraduate degrees would be given options to shift.
The medical college would have 500 beds and 12 operation theatres.
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Mr. Sivakumar said that its Department of Gynaecology would have the most modern facilities. The medical college, he said, would have all facilities available at a super-specialty hospital.
Medicines, he said, would be made available at all levels from primary health centres to medical colleges in the State. Doctors and paramedical staff would be appointed on contract for six months to address the shortage of staff.
He reiterated that the government was duty-bound to provide better healthcare for the poor in the State. “Money will not be a problem for it,” he said. M. Ummer, MLA; M.C. Mohandas, District Collector; P.A. Parvathi, General Hospital Superintendent; K. Sakeena, District Medical Officer; V. Sudhakaran and Salim Kuruvambalam, district panchayat standing committee chairpersons, accompanied the Minister during the visit to General Hospital.