Online Medicine

NEW DELHI: In a move that will regularise and upgrade the healthcare facilities for central government employees, the health ministry is likely to issue a directive asking more than 150 Central Services Medical Attendant (CSMA)-affiliated private hospitals to get the approval of National Accreditation Board for hospitals and healthcare providers (NABH).

CSMA rules allow the private hospitals to treat government employees and their family members in the absence of central government health scheme(CGHS) facilities.

The CSMA hospitals will be given about 12-18 months to upgrade themselves and those which do not receive the NABH’s approval will not be allowed to treat central government employees in the future. CGHS covers more than 50 lakh people in the country.

A health ministry official said, “As CGHS hospitals are limited to 28 cities throughout the country, private hospitals are allowed to treat central government employees. While the Quality Council of India (QCI) approves all the hospitals under CGHS, there is no proper standarisation of CSMA hospitals. There is a need to regularise and improve their facilities.” The official, however, added that the approval may be granted on a case to case basis.

The move will stop the misuse of government health insurance schemes, according to industry officials. But as most CSMA hospitals are small facilities with 30-100 beds, it will be difficult for such hospitals to obtain the approval.

QCI secretary general Girdhar Gyani told ET, “We have been asking the health ministry to allow only NABH approved hospitals under both the CGHS and CSMA scheme.”

QCI has inspected and recommended around 300 hospitals for CGHS recognition. But of these, only 25-30 percent can get NABH accreditation and another 30 percent may pass the test with some upgradation.

The Quality Council is also in talks with the insurance regulator IRDA to permit only NABH accredited hospitals to provide medical facilities to people covered under private insurance schemes. However, the proposal is considered impractical as only 20 hospitals have NABH accreditation nationwide and 60 cases are being processed.

COIMBATORE: The city-based Sankara Eye Hospital, is opening two eye hospitals in Karnataka and Gujarat within a fortnight.

This is part of its aim of replicating one community eye care hospital in every State of India, with ultimate goal of achieving 'vision 20/20 Status by 2020,' Hospital sources said.

The hospital at Shimoga in Karnataka would be opened on Oct 12 by Karnataka chief minister, B S Yeddyurappa, which would cover eight Central and Northers districts of that State under 'Vande Mataram Bharat Vision,' Dr R V Ramani, Managing Trustee, Sankara Eye Care institutions, told reporters here.

The 225-bedded super speciality eye care hospital, built at a cost of rs.12 crore, wherein 200 beds were for free service and 25 rooms for the paying patients, Ramani said. Another 225-bedded Hospital at a cost of rs.15 crore would be inaugurated by Chief Minister Narendra Modi on Oct 19 in Anand in Gujarat, in the presence of KaNchi Seer, Jayendra Saraswathi, he said.

Each of these hospitals would perform around 25,000 free surgeries every year, he said. Human resources, both medical and paramedical, have been recruited from the respective States and have been trained intensively here for two years, for being posted back in the respective regions, Ramani said.

When the new hospitals were fully operational, Sankara eye care institutions, with eight hospitals in their fold would be performing a total of two lakh free eye surgeries in a year. Two more hospitals; one in Punjab and another in Uttar Pradesh-- were in the pipeline, Ramani said.

HOUSTON -- (October 7, 2008) -- The Dan L. Duncan Cancer Center at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston is sponsoring two performances of the play "Educando a Papá" in Spanish to promote life-saving colorectal cancer screenings in the Hispanic community.

The play is written by Adelina Venegas and produced by Grupo de Teatro Somos Todos. The plot follows Anita, who is about to graduate, but the festivities are interrupted when a friend's battle with colorectal cancer makes Anita realize that her parents are at risk. She and her aunt, a nurse, use song, humor, information and love to persuade Anita's parents to get screened.

Two performances are scheduled as followed:

• Saturday, Oct. 11 at 6 p.m.
  Southwest Multi-Service Center
  6400 High Star, 77520
  Prevencion de Cancer will be held from 4-7 p.m. and will include information tables, breakout sessions on cancer prevention, raffles and refreshments.
• Saturday, Nov. 1 at 6 p.m.
  Ripley House, 4410 Navigation, 77011
  Dia de los Muertos celebration

Performances are free and open to the public. For more information, call 713-798-2338.

NEW DELHI/BANGALORE: Fortis Healthcare is learnt to be in final stages of discussions to enter into a joint venture (JV) with Bangalore-based NU Hospitals. Fortis Healthcare is expected to have management control and rename the hospital under its brand, sources said.

When contacted, a Fortis Healthcare spokesperson said: “We don’t comment on market speculations.” N U Hospitals officials denied having discussions with Fortis. “The hospital is not involved in any talks for any joint venture. We are not the hospital in question, ” NU Hospitals CEO & MD Shriram Vijayakumar told ET.

However, sources said Fortis is expected to initially invest around Rs 50 crore in NU hospital for significant minority stake. The fund would be used to scale up the hospital’s operations and also expand its speciality area. Based in central Bangalore, NU Hospital is a nephro-eurology speciality hospital run by a trust.

HOUSTON -- (October 6, 2008) -- A $7.2 million, five-year promise grant from the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation will help Dr. Powel Brown, professor in the Lester and Sue Smith Breast Center at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, use the tools of genomics and proteomics to develop effective therapies for estrogen receptor-negative breast cancer.

The grant is one of $100 million in grants from Komen to 81 institutions worldwide.

"This promise grant from Komen will give us the opportunity to identify new ways to treat this particularly difficult breast cancer, estrogen receptor-negative breast cancer," said Brown, also associate director of cancer prevention at the Dan L. Duncan Cancer Center at BCM. "This type of breast cancer is known as a triple threat breast cancer, as it currently has no known treatment targets."

Brown's funding is one of seven promise grants designed to enable scientists and doctors to work together in new ways to bring treatments out of the laboratory to patients as quickly as possible.

Brown and his collaborators will study changes in breast tumors at the DNA, RNA and the protein level. Understanding whether certain breast cancer gain or lose gene function or if certain proteins exist at high levels will help them determine where to intervene to stop cancer at the cellular level.

Collaborators include Dr. Jenny Chang, medical director of the Smith Breast Center, Dr. Ching Lau and, Dr. Susan Hilsenbeck, all of BCM; and Dr. Gordon Mills and Dr. Ana Gonzalez-Angulo of The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center.

Also receiving funding from Komen is Dr. Debananda Pati, assistant professor of pediatrics – hematology and oncology at BCM whose work deals with mammary stem cells and their relationship to breast cancer. Pati's grant of $180,000 over three years is designed to encourage young scientists in the field.

The commitment from Komen is the largest commitment of breast cancer research funding by a single nonprofit organization.

For more information on breast cancer research at Baylor College of Medicine, visit http://www.bcm.edu/news/packages/breastcancer.cfm.