Dialysis treatment: State forms state-level tech panel

Kolkata: Health department has formed a state-level technical expert committee for dialysis for better implementation of the Pradhan Mantri National Dialysis Programme (PMNDP).

The 18-member expert committee will be working under the chairmanship of Director of Medical Education. The Director of Health Service will act as co-chairperson in the committee.

There will be 16 other senior health officials. State government has been in the process of enhancing dialysis infrastructure across Bengal.

State government is setting up free dialysis units at fair-price dialysis centres which have come under the private-public partnership (PPP) model.

These units are coming up in various medical colleges and several district and sub-divisional hospitals.

A recent health department order said that all the patients requiring such dialysis services as recommended by the OPD/IPD and emergency of the facility would be given the service including the cost of the consumable (if any) without having to incur any out-of-pocket expenditure.

Health department has already written to the chief medical officer of health in the districts and also to the superintendents of various medical colleges for the smooth implementation of the project.

The department is organising a training programme for all government hospitals having a dialysis unit. During the training, emphasis will be given on the online data entry regarding the dialysis sessions.

The hospitals having dialysis infrastructure will have to upload the data in the PMNDP portal of Swasthya Bhawan.

State health department has given utmost importance to strengthening the digital platform and a comprehensive data management system.

Incidentally, the state government is setting up peritoneal dialysis units in far-off districts like Cooch Behar, Darjeeling, Alipurduar, Bankura, and Purulia so that patients from the rural areas do not need to come down to the city hospitals.

As per the primary plans, the Health department is trying to set up a peritoneal dialysis unit in each district especially those situated far away from Kolkata.

The main purpose of the move is to ensure that the patients requiring peritoneal dialysis can avail the services from their nearest health facility.

Once the project is implemented, it would remove the burden on medical colleges in Kolkata as well.