Germans to study how to improve healthcare

PESHAWAR, March 27: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Health Department will conduct a study in April this year to determine the weaknesses in the health delivery system and make a plan for ensuring quality health services to people of the province. "During the study, we will analyse the factors hampering the provision of quality healthcare to the people. The study will be conducted with the technical support of German government during which the service delivery at the government and private healthcare outlets would be studied," said officials at the health secretariat. A meeting held in this connection on Friday agreed to conduct the study next month. The German government will hire the services of consultants, who will examine the quality of healthcare at the local, tehsil, district and tertiary level healthcare institutions and recommend ways to remove weaknesses at different levels. The officials said that the findings of the study would be implemented for the long-term benefit of the patients. Officials, who represented Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the meeting, said that in the past the government had agreed on health insurance scheme in collaboration with German government, but that model implemented in other countries was found inappropriate for the province due to different socio-cultural and economic environment. The experts will also examine implementation capacity of the government, and social environment and acceptability besides giving a mechanism for removal of problems in the health system. Health officials say that it is a matter of concern that the cost of same surgeries and medical procedures are different in the private sector and the broad-based study is meant to know the reasons for varying rates and make plans to bring it to an affordable level for people. Access to healthcare and barriers to the delivery of services will be identified and steps recommended for improving all types of services in public and private hospitals besides making specialised services affordable the poor. The officials said that another meeting will be held soon to finalise the terms of reference (ToRs) of the study. The study will also identify the managerial problems in healthcare system so as to know the reasons for deteriorating patient care services despite Rs12 billion annual spending.