Chandigarh: To overcome the shortage, the Punjab health department has hired 63 specialists and 235 paramedical staff.
Punjab health minister Balbir Singh Sidhu handed over the appointment letters to the new appointees. Of total specialists doctors, 23 are gynaecologists, 18 paediatricians, five surgeons, five psychiatrists and 12 are from medicine. Sidhu instructed the officials to allot stations to them near their home town so they can perform better.
Appointment letters were also been given to 13 psychologist, 33 TB health visitor, 35 pharmacist, 29 laboratory technician, 34 senior treatment supervisor and 91 computer operator.
The minister said recruitments were done with transparency under the National Health Mission, Punjab. He said around 4,000 medical, paramedical and other clerical and ministerial staff had been appointed in the department so far, which had resulted in extensive improvement in hospital performance.
Sidhu said that the Union government had given Punjab a target of converting 2,950 sub-centres into fully-fledged community health centres by 2023 but the state would achieved it by 2021. He said that with a view to expedite the process, advertisement to recruit 1,000 community health officers has been released and about 900 had already been hired.
