In what could be a significant move, the Karnataka health minister Ramesh Kumar has sought improved regulation of private run hospitals to draw focus on patient care.
Bangalore Mirror reported that Kumar has decided to replace the Karnataka Private Establishment (KPME) 2007 with the Central-level Clinical Establishment Act (CEA), which would enable better regulation of private hospitals.
The Health and Family Welfare minister said, “The present act focuses only on registration of laws with hardly any ethical boundaries. The main aim of assessing the act is to fix specific tariffs for various procedures conducted at hospitals. Currently, there are a lot of variations as far as pricing is concerned between government and private hospitals, with most private hospitals charging as much as they like.”
“We are allocating almost Rs 200 crore under the chief minister's relief fund and a majority of this goes to private hospitals. The same is the case with reimbursing of medical expenses to government employees under various state and Central schemes. For instance, the price of a stent is around is 55,000 in a government hospital but runs into lakhs at private hospitals. Almost 70 per cent of the funds under the Suvarna Arogya Suraksha Trust also go to private hospitals for various procedures. We need accountability in terms of expenditure at both private and government hospitals, and hence there is a need for revamping, revitalising and even scrapping of the KPME Act,” he added.
The newspaper added that a 20-member committee headed by principal secretary and Justice Vikramjit Sen will suggest recommendations, and a decision would be taken within three months.
CEA would focus more on patient care and replace the earlier KPME, which had limited powers.
Shalini Rajneesh, principal secretary, Health and Family Welfare Department, said, “The CEA is a Central act that was introduced in 2007 and has more powers. Now we are introducing the state version of the Central act, which has specific penalties for specific violations. The main aim is to create an ethical environment and make it more patient-centric.