PESHAWAR, July 9: About 10,000 paramedics serving at different public sector health institutions in the province have been waiting to work under a proper service structure.
Talking to Dawn here on Wednesday, president NWFP paramedical staff Sirajuddin Burki said: “Despite formal announcements by provincial chief ministers in 1989 and 1997, we are yet to get a proper service structure.”
He said frequent changes in provincial governments had been an obstacle to forming a service structure.
The matter remained in cold storage till the sitting senior minister Sirajul Haq promised that he would announce the service structure on May 31, but could not keep his promise, he said.
As a result a committee was constituted that submitted its report on June 12, response to which was still awaited, he added.
Paramedics including dispensers, radiographers, operation theatre and physiotheraphy assistants, laboratory and ECG technicians have formed a tricycle team with doctors and nurses in the province that provides treatment facilities to the people at the district, tehsil and agency headquarters and tertiary-care hospitals.
However, there is a slim chance that these paramedics would get promoted, contrary to doctors and nurses who work under a proper service structures. Less than 100 paramedics promoted to BPS-16, the highest grade in the profession after rendering 30-35 years of services in settled areas, whereas in Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) out of 1,305 only 16 paramedics have been promoted to BPS-16.
In disciplines like ECG and dialysis they are appointed to BPS-9, whereas their counterparts in other disciplines like dispensaries, radiography, operation theatres and laboratory paramedics are employed in BPS-5 or BPS-6.
In remote areas the basic health units and dispensaries are virtually run by paramedics.
Mr Burki said that the government was sending doctors and nurses for specialised training abroad, but there were no such facility for paramedics.
Two years ago, the government had stopped advance increments on extra qualification which further hit the paramedics.