BENGALURU: The government has approved the hiring of 150 health workers to set up eight Mother and Child Health (MCH) wings in existing hospitals in Karnataka. The process of recruitment will take place over the next two weeks, after which the services will be up and running.
The wings will cater to a population of at least 5 lakh. Dr N Rajkumar, deputy director, Mother Health Programme, said these wings will give exclusive antenatal (during pregnancy), intra natal (during delivery) and postnatal (post delivery) care for women and children. The locations have been picked based on the track record of high delivery load.
For example, some of these places have over 1,000 babies delivered per year.” The centres include Bidar district hospital, SNR district hospital in Kolar, Government Hospital in Sira of Tumakuru district, District Hospital in Chitradurga, Public Hospital in Vantamuri of Belagavi district, Community Health Centre in Nayakanahatti in Chitradurga district, Public Hospital in Chikkaballapur and Public Hospital in Gangavathi in Koppal. “Nayakanahatti was chosen as it lacks health facilities.
These centres will help boost institutional deliveries as opposed to home births,” Dr Rajkumar added. In the past few years, over 72 Mother and Child Health hospitals have been sanctioned at various points of time, of which 45 have completed construction and the remaining are still undergoing civil work. As per a note on MCH wings, the services include 24/7 normal delivery, C-section, newborn care services, a blood storage unit, laboratory services and ultra sonography services for pregnant women.
They should be established as a first referral unit only and must have a bed occupancy of more than 70. However, as per the department, five of the eight centres have either 50 or 30 beds. Only Bidar district hospital, SNR district hospital and Government Hospital in Sira have 100 beds. “Those with less than 70 beds will be upgraded in the future,” Dr Rajkumar stated.
The eight wings with 150 health staff, include gynaecologists, anaesthetists, paediatrician, radiologist, nurse superintendent, senior nurses and pharmacists. They have been established with funds from National Health Mission, National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development, Rural Infrastructure Development Fund and Smart City.