Punjab: Lack of staff in dispensaries

Punjab: World Homeopathy Day is observed every year on April 10 to mark the birthday of Dr Hahnemann, the founder of homeopathy. The Punjab government is organising a state-level function to celebrate the day on April 9 in Chandigarh, but the ground reality of the homeopathy department in the state is pathetic. Instead of organising the function, the government should have conducted interviews to fill the vacant posts as the department is facing acute shortage of staff and is in a very poor condition. The state has 217 homeopathic dispensaries since 1976. Of these, 110 are under the state government, while the rest work under the National Health Mission (NHM). There are 23 posts of district homeopathic officers in the state-run dispensaries, but only four are filled and one DHO is looking after five to six districts. Out of a total of 88 posts of homeopathic medical officers, 47 are lying vacant. There are 110 posts of homeopathic dispensers, of which 76 are lying vacant. Compared to the state government dispensaries, the situation is better in the dispensaries being run under the National Health Mission. Out of 99 posts of homeopathic medical officer in the dispensaries being run under NHM, only 12 posts are vacant. There are a total of 107 posts of dispensers, out of which 21 are vacant. In Ludhiana, DHO Dr Gurdarshan Kaur is handling the charge of five districts due to shortage of staff and the situation is the same in other districts. The Homeopathic Medical Officers Association, Punjab has been regularly writing to the government to fill the vacant posts, but to no avail. “Doctors in the dispensaries are not only attending to patients but also registering patients, preparing medicines and giving medicines to patients. In the absence of class IV employees, doctors are getting the dispensaries cleaned from their own pockets,” the association members said in a recent memorandum to the government. Eight homeopathic dispensaries in the district have been upgraded to AYUSH Health and Wellness Centres, which has increased the workload of these dispensaries as all work in these dispensaries is done online. “Doctors have to register patients online, link patient health records, prepare excel sheets and enter details of every patient visiting the dispensary. No separate staff has been appointed to do the online work and doctors are doing this work themselves along with their other work. Sometimes the server goes down or the internet does not work, especially in villages. The whole day is spent in doing online work. Data entry operators should be appointed to handle this work,” said the homeopathic medical officer. Dr Harinder Pal Singh, director of the homeopathy department, said there is a huge shortage of staff in the department. The government has been informed about this several times, but to no avail.