PM-JAY portal snags leave patients in a spot in Odisha
CUTTACK: The recent launch of Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY) in Odisha might have brought with itself the promise of an improved healthcare delivery system, but the complexities in its implementation on the ground has left patients and healthcare personnel in a sticky situation.
In such a scenario, patients with life-threatening diseases, given the time-sensitive nature of their conditions, are more at risk as delay in treatment can pose severe consequences.
In a recent instance, a 52-year-old brain stroke patient, who was in coma and required immediate surgery, was turned away by a city-based private hospital because he could not undergo the iris scanning. Unable to avail the scheme’s benefits and the pricey ICU charges left his family with no other option than to leave the hospital. He was, however, lucky as the next hospital he got admitted to, carried out his iris scanning during the CT scanning procedure, and his surgery was conducted smoothly.
In another case, family members of a 42-year-old man suffering from strangulated hernia had to pay cash to conduct his surgery as there appeared a glitch while uploading his ration card on the portal. Though they visited the Jan Seva Kendra for help and also dialled the helpline number 104, nothing could solve their problem. Since there is possibility of gangrene if strangulated hernia is not operated within 48 hours, the family members had no other option than to pay cash for surgery.
The protocol used in the earlier Bjiu Swasthya Kalyan Yojana (BSKY) was very simple. Any member of the family could enrol the patient under the scheme just by using his Aadhaar card. But, in AB PM-JAY, self-identification through iris scanner is necessary which is often difficult in some cases, especially when a patient is in coma stage, said a doctor who runs a private hospital.
“We also face problems in uploading the patient data on the portal. Sometimes, when the server is down, the system gets formatted and we are required to upload the documents again from scratch. While in BSKY there was no size limit for uploading documents, in AB PM-JAY, the limit has been set to 1 MB which is not sufficient for a doctor to mention details of diagnosis and treatment etc.,” he added.
“In most cases, patients’ names do not appear on the portal. Another major issue is the OTP-based document processing which is time-taking,” said another hospital owner.
Dr Rashmi Ranjan Satpathy, nodal officer for AB PM-JAY in Cuttack, however assured that though the process is time-consuming, patients’ healthcare is not being neglected. “More than 3,000 claims are being processed on a daily basis. Repeated instructions are being given to the superintendents of the empanelled hospitals about the alternative login method,” he said adding, they would consider a refresher training if the hospital operators and officials seek.