PESHAWAR, April 19: The Khyber Institute of Child Health is starting community paediatrics courses to cater to the needs of the sick children in the province.

“Shortage of paediatricians have been adversely affecting the child health due to which we are going to start MSc programme in community paediatrics to train doctors, nurses and doctors in child health management,” said Professor Gohar Rehman, head of the Khyber Institute of Child Health, while talking to Dawn.

According to him, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has about 250 paediatricians for 22 million population which means that for 500,000 children we have one paediatrician against the WHO’s criteria of one paediatrician for 4,000 children. To cope with the situation, the KICH will start two-year postgraduate MSc courses for doctors who would then be posted at the rural hospitals.

Degrees would be issued by the Khyber Medical University but the candidates would be required to qualify entrance test for admission into the course to be approved by the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council.

The MSc in community paediatrics would be the first of its kind to be started in the country from August this year in which 30 doctors would get enrolled.

The problem of malnourishment, anaemia, infections and immunisation had also been affecting the child health due to which the institute had planned to impart training to paramedics, nurses and lady health visitors in community paediatrics.

At present, the province doesn’t have trained nurses and paramedics in paediatrics due to which the healthcare facilities are unable to provide desired level of care to the children. Community-oriented sickness of children and their management is being accorded top priority at the institute for which affiliation with the international institutes had been sought.

“Over a period of couple of years, the province would get enough number of trained paediatric nurses and paediatrician who would be able to identify the child health problems and take measures for management,” Dr Rehman said. The courses, which had been designed and approved by the KICH’s Board of Studies, also included the management of disasters for child health.

Ton help resolve the child health issues, the institute will also start collaboration with the hospitals to refer the children inflicted with chronic ailment to the secondary and tertiary care facilities for management. Majority of the childhood diseases were curable but the complications occur when the patients aren’t referred to the hospitals in time, he said.

The institute, he said would act as an umbrella organisation to integrate the child health facilities at the province level.