PESHAWAR, Dec 26: The much-touted institutional private practice scheme, introduced in the major hospitals of the province some times back, has failed to achieve its objective mainly due to the non-cooperation of senior medical consultants, sources in the health department told Dawn.
They said despite tall claims made by the government and much efforts on the part of respective administration of major autonomous hospitals, so far no substantial results had been achieved in this regard. Hospital statistics suggest a thin attendance of patients at the hospitals for private consultation by the doctors.
The provincial government launched the institutional private practice scheme last May in the four big hospitals - Lady Reading Hospital, Khyber Teaching Hospital, Hayatabad Medical Complex and Ayub Medical Complex.
The move basically aimed at generating revenue for the health sector in addition to providing a chance to the patients to get private consultation at the government hospitals. Out of the total fee of Rs300 per patient, a doctor’s share is Rs180, while the rest of the amount goes to the hospital.
However, the sources said, the administration of these hospitals seemed to have failed in realizing these objectives as, neither the scheme gave any respite to the patients nor brought financial benefit to these hospitals.
“The basic aim behind launching the private practice scheme in the hospitals was to generate revenue for the resources-starved health sector,” said an official of the health department. The scheme was launched with much enthusiasm by the administration of these hospitals, but the scheme failed miserably, the sources said.
When asked about the reasons behind failure of this scheme, the health department official blamed senior consultants of the major hospitals. He said these senior doctors had opposed the idea of institutional private practice from the very beginning.
“Actually, they (the senior and junior doctors) feared that its success would cast negative effects on their private practice and this caused them to take steps for the failure of the scheme,” he observed.
Some senior doctors, when contacted by Dawn, however, refuted the charge that they were responsible for the failure of institutional private practice. Terming it an imposed decision, many of them said that they were not taken into confidence before the launching of this scheme nor their demands and reservations were fully taken into consideration.
“After completing their hospital duty, like all government officials, doctors should also be allowed to make their own decision whether to take rest or go to their clinics”, complained a child specialist who termed the whole exercise a “bureaucratic programme” made by the people with little knowledge of medical profession.
Similarly, another senior physician complained of thin attendance of patients at hospital clinics. He said patients preferred to visit private clinics over private clinics set up in hospitals .
Besides, he also pointed out lack of diagnostic facilities at the government hospitals and said this factor also discouraged the patients from coming to hospitals for private consultation.
Dr Mohammad Jamil, chief executive of Lady Reading Hospital, felt that the process was encouraging but so far not streamlined. In the given situation, it was a good effort to generate revenue for the health sector as well as providing health services at the hospital premises.
He also complained of non-cooperation by senior consultants to the private practice scheme and termed it main reason behind its failure. In addition to this, Dr Jamil also mentioned space problem at the government hospitals.
Talking about the advantages of this scheme, the LRH chief said it would not only generate money for the major hospitals but would also benefit the tehsil and district headquarter hospitals. For the successful running of this practice, however, the government should take senior consultants into confidence and give due consideration to their suggestions.