50% govt hospitals to improve in one and a half years; NQAS certificate to be made mandatory by Health Ministry

The Centre has rolled out a program to ensure quality standards in every hospital nationwide. This would cover everything from primary health centers and district hospitals to Ayushman Arogya Mandir. First, the target for 50% of hospitals within one and half years till December 2025. The deadline for completion of all quality certifications is December 2026.

The Union Health Ministry has announced this in a program organized on Friday at Vigyan Bhavan in New Delhi. As per the ministry, they will improve the quality and treatment along with the states in government hospitals. More than two lakh government hospitals and 1.40 lakh Ayushman Arogya Mandirs have been established in the country. For the first time in the year 2007, Indian Public Health Standards were implemented to improve the quality of health services, but till now, it has not been fulfilled in more than 80 percent of hospitals. There are two lakh hospitals in whom, 40451 were inspected and out of this, 32362 did not fully meet the standards. It is because of this that now the Centre has made National Quality Assurance Standards (NQAS) mandatory for every hospital in collaboration with the states.

Union Health Secretary Apurva Chandra said, "Virtual visits would be done using online technology for quality certification. After this, 10 percent of these centers will be selected and a team will physically visit and evaluate all the services there.".

Dr. Madhu Gairola, Superintendent, Veerangana Avantibai District Hospital, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, stated that when in 2015 this whole process was brought before them related to quality and standards, it seemed impossible. Still, then the entire team worked by the checklist. This made their hospital stand first across the state from 2016 to 2023. Dr. Gaurav Kumar Jain of the Community Health Center in Pali, Madhya Pradesh, stated, "I underwent training for the first time in Bhopal in July 2023 and was advised to look towards quality and standards. First, we started working on cleanliness with the cooperation of the state and district administration.".

Listened to problems of cleaning staff and worked on the solution. Along with it, we worked on Obstetrics and Antibiotics. The Doctors at Srinagar Government Medical College have informed that Hazratbal Health Center, in Jammu and Kashmir, got the certificate by fulfilling all health quality standards in a few months. There was much to learn from the feedback of the patients who were being treated here and from the health workers.