KTH admin slams Sehat Sahulat Programme management

PESHAWAR: The administration of Khyber Teaching Hospital (KTH) took exception to the issues related to the Sehat Sahulat Card programme and accused its management of causing serious complications to patients.

A meeting, chaired by KTH Hospital Acting Director Prof Roohul Muqeem, noted that the team of Sehat Sahulat Card programme was not facilitating the patients in KTH. He complained that the DMO of Sehat Sahulat Card programme visited the hospital on his own will and that too for a short period.

The hospital acting director was told that DMO of the Sehat Sahulat Card programme has been assigned monitoring of other private hospitals in Peshawar by his department, and the patients admitted in second largest hospital of the province, KTH, are not been facilitated timely and efficiently, thus the patient care is adversely being affected.

“The staff deputed by Sehat Sahulat Card programme in KTH is deficient and non-cooperative. They are not observing duty schedule,” the KTH administration said in the meeting.

The officials said there was no facilitation by the Sehat Sahulat Programme in the IBP and the staff deputed the programme used to leave the hospital before IBP shift.

They noted that the IBP patients are left, discouraged and kept pending till the next morning.

The officials said that KTH has faced and was still facing financial losses worth millions of rupees due to the expenditures beyond the available limit in facilitation of the Sehat Sahulat Card patients due to the negligence of the previous hospital directors, Directorate of Finance, Pharmacy Department and officials of Sehat Sahulat Card facilitation office.

The expenditure of KTH per patient is for more than the approved package and receivable. Due to this negligence, the IBP pharmacy at MTI KTH has suffered huge financial loss. As per the available records, the local purchase (LP) contractor claimed that individual Sehat Sahulat Card patients are even in lacs. They shared details of a number of patients whose expenditures were beyond their limit.

“It’s clear from the record that KTH has suffered a huge financial loss due to irresponsible attitude of Sehat Sahulat programme officials, negligence of ex-hospital directors, Directorate of Finance and Pharmacy Department,” the KTH administration officials said.

They said the KTH have repeatedly approached the relevant officials of Sehat Sahulat Programme for a review of the treatment packages and categories in the Sehat Sahulat Card but no positive response was received from the officials of the programme to date.