PESHAWAR, May 6: NWFP Health Minister Inayatullah Khan has sought proposals for improving gynae services at teaching hospitals in the city.

He was presiding over a meeting here on Saturday to sort out ways for improving gynae services at the city hospitals.

Health secretary Abdus Samad Khan, Dr Nasreen Rubi, Dr Bilqees Afridi, Dr Jamila Javed Shah, Dr Perveen Azeem, Dr Sadaqat Jabeen and Prof Shahnaz Akhtar attended the meeting which reviewed gynae services at the Lady Reading Hospital and the Khyber Teaching Hospital.

The participants stressed the need for improving gynae services at the hospitals.

Briefing the meeting about services provided by the gynae units of the LRH, Dr Rubi said 31,336 patients had been admitted and 11,000 deliveries had taken place at the hospital during last year. She said 5,724 operations and 1,756 caesarean operations had been conducted at the hospital last year.

About services provided by the gynae units of the Khyber Teaching Hospital during 2005, Dr Jamila said 20,000 patients had been admitted to the units and 9,000 deliveries had taken place. She said 5,000 operations had been conducted.

The participants called for providing more surgical facilities at the hospitals and appointing additional anaesthesia technicians, nurses and woman paramedics to make services delivery more efficient.

Similarly, they said, a separate blood bank and a laboratory should be set up at the gynae units at the Lady Reading Hospital.

The meeting said a third gynae unit should be established at the LRH and work on a sanctioned gynae unit at the KTH should be accelerated.

It asked gynaecologists working at district hospitals not to refer patients unnecessarily to the teaching hospitals.

The minister called for proposals for improving gynae facilities at the teaching hospitals so that the same could be included in the fiscal budget and the Annual Development Programme.