THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Nearly two years after its launch, the National Medical College Network (NMCN) is on its way to implementation.
In the latest development, the Health Department, while granting administrative sanction to the project, also issued a direction to form an administrative committee and a content development committee at Government Medical College (GMC), Thiruvananthapuram, which is the Regional Resource Centre (RRC) for NMCN’s implementation in Kerala, Karnataka and Lakshadweep. The move comes on the request of the NMCN nodal officer.
The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MHFW) had launched the project in June 2017.
“The Ministry came out with the project for interlinking India’s medical colleges to facilitate e-Education and National Rural Telemedicine Network for e-healthcare delivery. A month after its launch, the state also signed a Memorandum of Understanding with MHFW. However, nothing further happened,” said a Health Department officer.
‘There was no clarity’
The officer blamed the lack of clarity on NMCN’s implementation for the delay in its execution.
“Since July, 2017, the state submitted a slew of representations seeking clarity on the implementation of NMCN. However, the authorities concerned never responded,” the officer said.
“In January this year, all of a sudden, we received a letter from the NMCN nodal officer requesting administrative sanction for setting up an RRC at the Thiruvananthapuram GMC and constitution of an administrative committee and a content development committee for its implementation,” said the officer.
Now, as per an order, an administrative committee, having the director of Regional Cancer Centre (RCC), Thiruvananthapuram; the director of Sree Chithra Tirunal Institute of Medical Sciences and Technology (SCTIMST) and the principal of GMC, Thiruvananthapuram as members and the NMCN nodal officer as the convener, has been formed.
The committee can constitute a content development committee with faculty drawn from the RCC, SCTIMST, GMC and having representation from diagnostic, clinical and paramedical specialities by nomination.