SUBHASH MISHRA
Dhanbad, April 15: The empanelled private nursing homes/ hospitals here have decided to stop treatment of patients under the Ayushman Bharat Health Scheme due to long-pending bills not paid by the health department.
In Dhanbad, 36 hospitals, including 26 posh private nursing homes are registered for the treatment of patients under the ambitious health scheme of the health department.
The operators of all 24 empanelled private nursing homes in the evening today jointly informed media persons that since the health department has held up payment from December 2021, they are not in a position to carry out the scheme as they have been in debt for purchasing medicines and other essential items required for operations.
Private nursing homes operators claimed that payment of over Rs 10 crores to Rs 12 crores is pending, which has compelled them to stop treatment.
“We have served a letter to the civil surgeon (CS) Dhanbad Shyam Kishore Kant about our decision regarding stopping the treatment of patients under Ayushman Bharat from today ( Friday),” said the nursing homes owners.
The doctors and operators claimed that they had given pending bills to the civil surgeon twice, first in February and second on March 25 but no step was initiated to solve the problem of the empanelled hospitals.
Civil surgeon Dr Shyam Kishore Kant, when contacted, said that he had not received any letter from the empanelled private nursing homes but is aware of the problem. “ I will duly inform the headquarter of the health department for resolving the issue,” he said.
The empanelled private nursing homes operators said that they have taken medicines on credit from the market for the treatment of admitted patients. Even fees of anaesthesia doctors have not been paid, they added.
“ In this circumstance, we have no option but to stop treatment under the Ayushman Bharat scheme,” they said.
