The road to public health in Goa is indeed very long. It stretches from remote villages in faraway talukas, right through the community and urban health centres and the district hospitals and stops at the door of the Goa Medical College.
From a simple fever and common cold, to more serious ailments, “specialist treatment’ is the name of the game far cry from the olden days when the village dotor with one touch, effected magical cures.
The public health services are catered through 24 primary health centres (PHC), four community health centres (CHC), four urban health centres (UHC) and five Directorate of Health Services (DHS) hospitals apart from the state run Goa Medical College and Hospital (GMC) at Bambolim.
However, even after the availability of 279 beds in the 14 PHCs and 190 beds at the 4 CHCs, people of Goa travel long distances to get treated at GMC.
While officially all the PHCs and CHCs have designated doctors assigned for duty, there have been instances where doctors have demanded to be shifted to District Hospitals or to centres where there are more walk-ins of patients.
An official said that while the DHS has been trying to strictly execute the bond by the MBBS students in GMC, the government has, in many cases, relaxed the bond for students from outside the state.
Senior doctors attached to the DHS say the problem is complex and an easy solution is far from sight.
A doctor who didn’t wish to be named said, “It is true that people from the rural areas of the state are travelling long distances to get to either the district hospital or the GMC. Each patient wants to be checked by a specialist doctor. However, a PHC by definition itself is meant for providing primary health services as the first contact point.”
Stating that providing specialist at the PHC and CHC is unviable, the doctor further said that in absence of adequate number of cases a doctor would find himself unable to hone his skills. “To become a good doctor just knowledge is not enough. One needs practice which is important and this is only possible when you have patients”, he added.
A senior official in DHS informed that there are occasions when doctors from the locality have refused to work in their local PHCs. “We are surprised and clueless as to why doctors would not want to work in their own surroundings”, the official added.
And it is the reluctance of doctors, which is one of the major reasons for the neglect of PHCs. And if doctors are not available patients do not go to PHCs and this start the chain of neglect.
Despatches filed by our reporters from across Goa, describe the state of neglect our PHCs suffer from.
