Healthcare may get accreditation

The largely unorganised healthcare sector may finally see some regulation and standardisation through a system of accreditation.

According to government sources, the health ministry is in favour of setting up a national accreditation board, as early as the end of this year.

A draft report pertaining to this will be submitted tomorrow to the Quality Council of India(QCI) by a taskforce constituted jointly by the Confederation of Indian Industry's healthcare committee and the Indian Healthcare Federation.

QCI, an autonomous body created by an act of Parliament, will review the draft and throw it open to discussions. The barometres of standards in the draft are the quality of infrastructure, manpower, outcomes, incidence of infections, level of patient information, patient safety among many others.

Asked about the way they went about formulating the standards, YP Bhatia, CEO, Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute, who is also the chairperson on this taskforce said, "Many standards were studied like the Joint Commission International(JCI), Joint Commission on Health Organisation(JCHO), Australian and Thai accreditation standards."

"We have tried to take the best from each while keeping in mind that the recommendations need to be suited to India specific needs. Norms should simple to understand and follow without compromising on quality benchmarks."

Praneet Kumar, director, special projects, Fortis, agrees, saying the country's standards can't be an imitation of the Western ones simply because India has a "traditional philosophy of nursing at home".

Although accreditations are voluntary by nature, both Gupta and Kumar believe that this would raise the quality bar.

Gupta cited the example of JCHO in US which caught on there because insurance companies, social security agencies and the patients themselves demanded it.

In India too, market, community and quality forces will ensure in time a culture of adopting those standards will come by, he feels.

Another motivation which is spurring the industry in this direction is the booming 'Medical Tourism', wherein their share will rest on the credibility they can garner for themselves.

While the accrediation standards are for both private and government hospitals in secondary and tertiary care, stand alone diagnostics centers are out of its purview.

According to Kumar, regulation distinguishes between 'good, bad and the ugly' and accreditation distinguishes between ' good, better and the best'. While one lacuna has been fixed, another remains as this taskforce has little to offer on healthcare regulation front.