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| Jammu’s health budget skyrocketing | | | SALMAN NIZAMI
JAMMU JUNE 13: The state of health in Jammu region does not appear quite healthy if one looks at the amount spent on medicines on an annual average.
A research by Early Times has revealed that people spending at least Rs 500 Crores annually on purchase of drugs while the Government Medical College hospital alone earned Rs 1.10 Crores of selling the OPD tickets in last three years.
For last three years 10 lakh out patient department (OPD) tickets have been sold by the Government Medical College and Hospital Jammu. The Shri Maharaja Gulab Singh Hospital has sold 832045 tickets in last three years. The Health Department has sold over 50 lakh tickets in past three years.
In 2008, the Government Medical College and Hospital sold 705288 OPD tickets, highest in four years. In the same year the Government Medical College has sold 121500 tickets improving one lakh on previous years figure and in SMGS Hospital 279550 in the year 2006-07, 299935 in year 2007-08, and 272560 in year 2008- March 2009.In 2007-2008, 50 lakh OPD tickets were sold by the Health Department.
The census of 2001 describes the population of Jammu 50 lakhs. “The figures indicate that people visit hospitals in large numbers,” says a consultant in GMC. He however said that the sale of OPD tickets doesn’t mean that equal number of people have visited the hospital. He said on one OPD ticket patient visits hospital at least three times. With large number of people visiting the hospitals, Jammu has become heaven for drug companies as well. The drug controller Ashok Gupta says there are 10,000 chemist and wholesalers in Jammu. He says annually they do the business of over Rs 300 crores in Jammu province. However, General Secretary of Chemists and Distributors Association Jammu says drug companies do business upto Rs 500 crore annually in Jammu.
The Principal Government Medical College Jammu Dr Rajinder Singh doesn’t describe the situation as alarming. He says people are aware about their health problems and they visit the GMC, and its associated hospital knowing well that they would get better health care facility there. “At the district level people usually don’t get the better facilities and this prompts them to visit the GMC and the associated hospitals of GMC,” Dr Rajinder said. He however said the flow of patients was causing problem for the hospitals. “If we start taking patients on referrals from the districts hospital that would help to improve the health system and reduce the burden on the GMC and the associated hospitals of the GMC,” Singh said.
The Director Health Jammu Dr. Jasbir Singh agrees that the tertiary care hospitals are over-burdened. He says there is need to create 300 bed hospitals at the district level and recruit specialists. He said there was need to infuse more manpower and infrastructure in rural health sector.
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