ISLAMABAD: To counter the opposition’s campaign that the government of Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf (PTI) has failed to deliver, Prime Minister Imran Khan recently directed all ministries and divisions to highlight their success stories.

In this regard, the Ministry of National Health Services (NHS) has prepared a list of its achievements to show that it has completed a number of projects and tasks to facilitate citizens and prove that the health sector was one of the main priorities of the government.

“The direction was given during a meeting of the federal cabinet that ministries and divisions should prepare lists of their performance related to human welfare issues, and highlight them to show that the government really cares about the citizens and was willing to address their problems,” NHS ministry spokesperson Sajid Shah told Dawn.

He said a list of achievements had been prepared to bring it on record that steps had been taken during the last few months to provide relief to the people.

PM has asked all ministries to highlight their success stories, official says

Documents available with Dawn show that in the past there was the issue of disposal of hospital waste in the federal capital due to which not only infections and diseases spread but also the waste was creating environmental pollution.

“Two incinerators have been installed at Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) this year and made fully functional. The machine takes approximately one hour to incinerate 120kg waste at a temperature of 1,400C. Safe hospital waste segregation practices are implemented as per standard of Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Rules 2005,” it stated.

A Q-management system is installed at all the outpatient departments (OPD), radiology and pathology registration counters at Pims to facilitate patients.

“At the initial stage, patients take tokens from an automatic token machine and wait for the display of their numbers on the registration counter. When the turn comes, the patient gets his registration slip and moves towards the concerned doctor’s clinic. As many as 13 automatic machines have been installed in the hospital,” according to the documents.

About Polyclinic, the documents claimed that hospital’s three chamber incinerator had the capacity to dispose of 125 kg waste per hour. It also has digital display at the OPD to facilitate patients to reach to doctors.

National Institute of Rehabilitation Medicine (NIRM) has a fully computerised reception counter providing separate desks for male and female patients. For this purpose, female receptionists have been deputed to deal with women. Under the government policy, senior citizens are directly catered to in a filter clinic and referred to the relevant department.

Mr Shah said a number of steps were taken by Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Health Dr Zafar Mirza to provide relief to the citizens.

He said the performance reports would also be sent to the Prime Minister Office.

Published in Dawn, November 24th, 2019