Guwahati, April 5: The Assam department of health and family welfare is all set to conduct the Swasthya Sewa Utsav, a one-of-its-kind initiative in the country, for government health institutions on the lines of Gunotsav from Thursday.
The department is leaving no stone unturned for smooth implementation of the three-day programme in all the identified health institutions.
The primary objectives of the Utsav are to provide comprehensive healthcare services to the community by assessing the gaps, to make the health facilities IPHS (Indian Public Health Standards) compliance, to create and share sustainable practices related to key areas of concern in public health facilities linked to positive health outcomes, to promote cleanliness, hygiene and infection control practices in public health facilities, to reduce infant mortality rate and maternal mortality ratio and to reduce out of pocket expenditure of the public.
In this regard, National Health Mission, Assam mission director M.S Lakshmi Priya, chaired a final review meeting with all the district teams for the Swasthya Sewa Utsav through a video conference on Wednesday.
The NHM Assam mission director advised all the districts to gear up for a suitable launch event and to be alert to mitigate any adverse situation.
During the VC, Priya also informed all the districts that as the Union health ministry is keen to take away the key learnings from the exercise, which has been initiated by the state health department, the districts needed to work as a team and make it a success.
It may be noted that the external evaluators, comprising senior IAS, IPS and ACS officers, have been deputed to all the districts for assessment of the health institutions during the programme.
The team for external evaluators will comprise two assessors – an MP, MLA or senior officers of various departments – while the other will be either a faculty member, doctor or post graduate students of medical colleges.
The programme will be conducted with the objective of providing quality healthcare services across the state, covering 1252 government health institutions (21 district hospitals, 16 sub-divisional civil hospitals, 205 community health centres and 1010 primary health centres).
The government health institutions will be assessed on infrastructure, human resources and service delivery. There will be a pre-defined checklist against each category of health institutions for the evaluators to complete the assessment of the facilities within the three days of the Utsav.
Altogether, 450 teams will be engaged during the programme.
Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had launched the official logo of the Swasthya Sewa Utsav at Janata Bhawan here on March 29, 2023 in the presence of the state health minister and senior officials of the health and family welfare department.