Bhubaneswar: As many as four new medical colleges will be set up and 147 hospitals will be upgraded in Odisha to strengthen health infrastructure, Health Secretary Shalini Pandit said Tuesday while speaking at Senior Officers’ Conference in Bhubaneswar.
As part of the Odisha government’s ‘Ama Hospital’ programme under 5T initiative, nearly 147 hospitals will be upgraded with an allocation of Rs 750 crore, Pandit informed.
Pandit mentioned that four new medical colleges are planned to be set up in Kalahandi, Talcher, Jajpur, and Kandhamal districts. Odisha currently has seven medical colleges.
On the upgradation front, it has been decided to run specialty hospitals in Angul, Barbil, Jharsuguda, and Bhadrak in public-private partnership (PPP) mode.
The state government has decided to establish hospitals on PPP mode in Jharsuguda specifically for cardiac and cancer care.
Pandit added that as part of the expansion of Biju Swasthya Kalyan Yojana (BSKY), 500 more hospitals are being empanelled outside Odisha. Additionally, Odisha government plans to transform the Capital Hospital in Bhubaneswar into a Post Graduate Institute.
The establishment of a 750-bed Bagchi Sri Shankara Cancer Hospital in Bhubaneswar will help fight cancer, she said.
Tata Memorial Centre is working with Government of Odisha and Department of Atomic Energy to establish a 200-bed state-of-the-art cancer hospital on the National Institute of Science Education and Research (NISER) campus, informed Pandit.
The Health Secretary stated that 3,000 doctors have been recruited through Odisha State Public Service Commission (OPSC) and that all of them will receive appointment letters in September. The Health Secretary also said that there are plans to hire 5,000 more doctors.
PNN