PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa health department has decided to include women in the management committees of primary and secondary healthcare facilities, insisting the initiative will promote transparency, efficiency and gender empowerment in decision-making processes regarding health services in the province.

“It was expedient to enhance the efficiency of healthcare facilities management, and to deliver healthcare services effectively, women should be included in primary health care committees and hospital management committees for the betterment of services,” reads a notification of the health department.

It added that there was a recognised need for enhancing focus on local issues, promoting transparency, and ensuring autonomy through increased community participation in decision-making for which women’s memberships in the management committees had been declared mandatory.

The notification also declared that it was imperative to improve decision-making processes by adopting a more inclusive and participatory approach, ensuring adequate representation of women in decision-making and adhering to international best practices for women’s empowerment.

“The competent authority has revised the composition of PCMCs and HMCs within primary and secondary healthcare facilities with immediate effect in the best public interest.”

The health department asked health facilities across the province to revise the structure of the committees by including women in primary and secondary level decision-making processes.

It added that those facilities had already been given guidelines regarding the operations of the committees and that the inclusion of women at the level of basic health units, rural health centres, civil hospitals and other hospitals was meant to resolve the problems of women in hospitals.

Meanwhile, the health officials told Dawn that granting representation to women in the management committees was also a demand of international organisations, especially the World Health Organisation and Unicef, to discuss the issues facing women in hospitals and seek their solutions.

They also said that the district health officers had been authorised to nominate women from within the community so that the hardships of women visitors to health outlets were highlighted and corrective steps taken.

The officials said that there was no representation of women in those management committees, which were tasked with managing the affairs of hospitals in a way that benefitted patients. They said that women’s participation in the decision-making process would help spotlight the problems of women visitors to the hospitals.

The officials said that they hoped that the revised committees would highlight the problems of women patients and recommend steps for improving health services in government hospitals.

They said that as per the notification, the committees would have lady health visitors, lady health supervisors, lady health workers and female medical technicians in the respective facilities or women community members to be nominated by the district health officers with the objective of promoting women’s health through participation in decision-making processes.

The officials said not only would the initiative improve women’s health but it would also strengthen children and neonatal health services at the primary and secondary level.

Published in Dawn, July 16th, 2024