Services in government hospitals of Punjab are set to get costlier, which will hit the underprivileged hard. The Punjab Health Systems Corporation (PHSC) has revised user charges by 10% to 50%. The revised charges will be implemented in all government hospitals and community health centres from July 1.
According to the revised rates, the parchi fee, or outpatient department (OPD) registration fee, has been raised from Rs 5 to Rs 10. This fee was just Rs 2 before April 5, 2013. The PHSC had last revised the rates in April this year.
Admission charges have been increased from Rs 25 to Rs 30 (general ward) and from Rs 100 to Rs 150 (private ward). To have rooms with coolers, patients will have to pay Rs 100 per day compared to Rs 50 till now. Many of the operation charges have also been hiked.
The facilities which will be provided free of cost from July 1 include cataract surgery (charges were Rs 250 earlier) and anti-rabies injections (charges used to be Rs 50 per dozen).
Talking to Hindustan Times, Hussan Lal, managing director, PHSC, said the rates had been revised on the basis of feedback from hospitals.
{{/usCountry}}Talking to Hindustan Times, Hussan Lal, managing director, PHSC, said the rates had been revised on the basis of feedback from hospitals.
{{/usCountry}}“Moreover, the prices of chemicals and raw material used for various tests have also increased.
Still, many facilities have been made free for patients,” he added.