PESHAWAR: Consultants who are opposed to the reforms launched by the provincial government in the health sector are eagerly awaiting the next general elections, hoping for defeat of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf and subsequent burial of the Medical Teaching Institutions (MTIs) Reforms Act and reverting to their powerful positions, which slipped away from their hands at the advent of the new piece of legislation.

Senior consultants at the public sector MTIs had never been as interested in election as they are these days because most of them have lost their unbridled powers and authority which they enjoyed prior to the law enforced in 2015, according to health professionals interviewed by this correspondent.

The law bringing reforms in the health system as part of government’s agenda has both critics and supporters. Prior to the new mechanism, the consultants remained at the helm of affairs in the hospitals where they would admit patients, more often those visiting their private clinics, at will because the beds in every ward stayed divided among the professors and associate and assistant professors. But now they don’t have any such authority as there are bed managers at the hospitals who take care of admissions.

Some consultants hope for PTI defeat to regain powerful positions

The consultants who held important posts, such as principals of the medical colleges, have been shown the door because the new law has paved the way for those with higher qualification and research to their credit to occupy such slots. Formerly, the governments used to appoint principals from a panel of three senior-most professors, from which one was awarded the position, now re-designated as dean.

“I am sure that PTI would lose the next election after its defeat in Lodhran, Punjab. The PTI was poised to lose NA-4 seat in Peshawar, but it retained it because of using official resources,” a senior physician claimed.

He alleged that the health reforms were in fact any eyewash and the situation would become even worse if the PTI got victory in the coming polls in KP.

Another senior doctor observed that other political parties would join hands against PTI in the election and Imran Khan-led party would be wiped from this province. “Their reforms are restricted to social media only and the ground realities are quite different,” he said and claimed the hospitals were being run by board of governors who didn’t have experience in healthcare.

The pro-reforms consultants have their own reasons to favour the PTI government. One consultant said that this government started the institution-based practice at the hospitals under which the patients were examined, investigated and operated upon by specialist doctors as opposed to uncontrolled private sector where the patients encountered plethora of issues such as unnecessary investigations for the sake of commissions and simple doctors posing as consultants.

At one of the hospitals, 24,000 patients were seen under IBP in the past one year, but only 18,000 blood and urine tests were carried out which meant that end to kickbacks could benefit the patients, he said. He said they had also started evening OPD in hospitals.

Opponents claim that the reform process is slow and politically-motivated because the doctors working at the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital and Research Centre called the shots at the BoG, while before the PTI government the senior bureaucrats would devise policies in a professional manner.

A senior medical teacher said that the reforms process in health sector had taken 50 years in UK to show results.

He said that the ongoing reform process in the province was sailing smoothly and the people had started witnessing improvement which would be more visible in coming years.

Other supporters of the new system say that earlier the chief executive and medical superintendent in major hospitals were appointed by the government, mostly on political grounds. However, after the MTI reforms nomenclature of these posts was changed to medical director and hospital director, respectively, who are appointed on merit by a panel of senior specialist doctors drawn from the major health institutions of the country.

A Swat-based consultant alleged that PTI had politicised the hospitals, and the other political parties would form an alliance to inflict a crushing defeat on it in the next elections.

Published in Dawn, February 19th, 2018