Baby Boom Concerns Meghalaya Doctors

By Manosh Das

Shillong, Feb 7 : Doctors have expressed concern over the high growth of population in Meghalaya. With the hill state registering one of the highest fertility rates and decadal growths across the country, the topic was raised by state health services doctors while presenting the findings of their research undertaken as part of their training in IIM Shillong recently.

As per Census data, the state's population grew from about a million in 1971 census to nearly three million in 2011, a three-fold increase in four decades. As per the latest census, the population of the state now stands at 29,64,007 - of which 5,55,822 are below six years of age - with a decadal growth rate of 27.82 per cent.

"How do we control the booming population of children at the age group of one to seven years," was one of the questions raised by the doctors. "Can we have disaster plan for Meghalaya? Why can't we upgrade the Civil Hospital in Shillong to the level of medical colleges? How do we regulate overcrowding in the city's Ganesh Das Hospital? Why do we emulate the best practices form NEIGRIHMS at Civil Hospital and Ganesh Das? How do we face the patient load in PHC and CHC across the state? How do we motivate pregnant women to go for hospital delivery rather than home delivery of children," were some of the other questions raised by the physicians.

According to an IIM-Shillong press release, the deteriorating work environment at PHC, CHC and Civil Hospitals in Garo Hills have made many doctors apprehensive. "They have urged the government to improve the working conditions and health infrastructure of the East and West Garo Hill districts," the release said. It added that the NRHM and state government have taken the advice of IIM-Shillong for designing and delivering hospital care system to be more "patient-friendly and socially responsible".

IIM-Shillong trained the second batch of 14 doctors under 15 credit IIM certificate programme - Sustainable Healthcare Management System. During the course, doctors learned how to lead from the front during crisis, motivate their staff under stress, read financial statements and preparing zero-based budgets and financial plans for their units/hospitals by utilizing NRHM schemes, WHO norms, MCI guidelines, government regulations.

"They also realised that the potential of their own health infrastructure for grooming a disease free healthy population in Meghalaya during 2020," a spokesperson for the youngest B-school and the only one in the Northeast said. Training for next batch of doctors at IIM-Shillong will commence in June next for a period of 30 days.