GUJRAT: The Punjab government has upgraded Aziz Bhatti Shaheed Hospital from a District Headquarters Hospital to a teaching hospital of the Nawaz Sharif Medical College.

The overall management of the hospital has been transferred to the Punjab government.

According to a notification issued by the provincial health department, the authority has approved attachment of ABS Hospital with the medical college, which was a constituent college of the University of Gujrat.

ABS Hospital will remain as a teaching hospital for the NSMC for five years. It had also been authorised to arrange funds and workforce for the improvement of physical infrastructure to bring the hospital on a par with other teaching hospitals.

The University of Gujrat management will sign a memorandum of understanding with the provincial health department for smooth functioning of the teaching hospital. The Punjab government will provide recurrent grant to the hospital through the district government according to the approved yardstick.

ABS Hospital consists of 480 beds, much more than the sanctioned 384. With the upgrade, the number of beds is likely to increase in the next fiscal year as some more departments will be launched. As per rules, the number of beds at a teaching hospital should be around 500, while governmental grant for it is said to be double from that for a DHQ Hospital.

As per plan, the Nawaz Sharif Medical College was supposed to have a separate teaching hospital, which had not been established yet due to shortage of funds. Even after four years since the initiation of classes the medical college could not have a separate building. The classes were being held in an academic block in the Hafiz Hayat Campus of the UoG.

The first batch of medical students was set to graduate this year and upgrading the ABS Hospital had become important to provide house job opportunities to the graduates.

Dr Syed Talat Iqbal, the coordination and management director at NSMC, told Dawn the teaching hospital had been a landmark achievement for the medical college. It would also be a blessing for the poor and needy people of Gujrat and adjoining districts to benefit from senior and specialist doctors.

He also said since the flow of funds for the medical college was “very slow”, the construction of academic blocks and other facilities, especially a separate teaching hospital, had become a daunting task. Even the funds allocated for the NSMC in the annual uplift budget could not be provided for four years, he added.

However, he expressed hope for “far better medical and treatment facilities” after the ABS Hospital was upgraded.

Published in Dawn, June 11th, 2014