The health of the Indian Armed Forces’ medical services is in a sorry state and is impacting the healthcare of its 13-lakh troops.
A Comptroller and Auditor General’s (CAG) report, tabled in Parliament last Friday, has found a 12 per cent shortage in the 3,868-strong medical officers and specialist cadre in military and field hospitals of the Army, Navy and the Air Force.
“Manpower in medical services is a critical component, having a direct bearing on patient care. There was an overall shortage of 12 per cent medical officers in hospitals,” the report said.
Only 3,385 of the medical officers and specialists were in service as on March 31, 2011. The report put the deficiency in the Army’s medical care at 36 per cent in field hospitals, six per cent in peripheral hospitals, 19 per cent in mid-zonal hospitals and nine per cent in zonal hospitals. Even among the command hospitals and specialist centres, there was a shortage of 25 per cent medical staff at Udhampur, whereas a 93 per cent increase in staff numbers was recorded at the coveted Research and Referral Hospital in Delhi, it said.
The audit also brought out that the attrition rate was high among medical officers recruited from 2006 to 2010. In all, there were 1,139 officers, who quit their military jobs in these years, and only 1,305 were recruited under both permanent and short service commission categories. During the same period, about 478 officers from the short service were made permanent. Between 2006 and 2010, about 190 specialists left the services on grounds of supersession, another 53 on compassionate grounds, and seven others due to low medical classification.