Maharashtra govt all set to adopt Clinical Establishment Act after 5 years

Five years after passage of Clinical Establishments (Registration and Regulation) Act by the Union government, the Maharashtra government has started efforts to adopt the Act by registering and regulating all clinical establishments in the state with an aim to ensure the minimum standards of facilities and services provided by them.

The draft Clinical Establishment Bill has been pending in the state since 2010 due to opposition from medical fraternity. Taking serious note of this, the public health department had set up a 19-member committee of doctors and non governmental organisations under the chairmanship of president of Maharashtra Medical Council Prof Dr Kishor Taori in December 2013 to look into the issues raised by doctors' body and make draft Clinical Establishment Bill Maharashtra specific.

“The committee was set up with a mandate to make Maharashtra specific clinical establishment draft bill, improving upon the Central Clinical Establishment Act, 2010. This was necessitated due to representation of organisation of doctors and few NGOs working for the patients’ rights. As such public health is in concurrent list and therefore state have got right to have its own law concerning the public health,” said a senior official familiar with the issue.

The committee had held 8 meetings to finalise the draft Bill. It submitted the draft Bill to the state government in August 2014. The draft Bill was sent to law and judiciary department in December 2014 to fine tune legalities. After working on legal framework of the draft Bill, the law and judiciary department sent it to finance department in June 2015. Now the finance department has sought response from public health department pertaining to certain provisions of the draft Bill, he said.

The official said that the public health department will soon answer the quarries and address the issues raised by finance department. Once draft Bill is cleared by finance department, state government will present it before cabinet ministers for approval. Once cabinet approves it, the draft Bill will be tabled in state assembly. The entire process will take 2-3 months. The draft Bill is likely to be tabled in the state assembly by the government in next session.

Shedding light on the provisions of draft Bill, he said that once implemented, the draft Bill will replace Bombay Nursing Homes Registration. Act, 1949 and make it mandatory for all clinical establishments in the state including day care centres, diagnostic centres and single-doctor clinics across all recognized systems of medicine both in the public and private sector except those run by the physiotherapists and defence forces to register themselves with three-tier special authority under the legislation. In municipal corporation and municipal council areas, the clinics are required to register with their respective health departments. In rural areas, the health establishments need to register themselves with district health officials.

He added, “So many provisions have been made in the draft Bill which protects the interest of patients as well as doctors. It also defines the emergency treatment and removes the confusion in the duty of doctors and also the responsibility of the state. The draft Bill also mentions about the single window system to provide hassle free registration process which will combine the efforts of various agencies. There will be transparency in the charges for various procedures which be agreed by both the parties. The grievance readdress system has been strengthened. Effort have been made to strengthen the bond between the patients and the doctor as the draft Bill brings about the clarity in several aspects between the doctor and the patients.”

The draft Bill also has provision to set up a council for clinical establishment to formulate standards of treatment to be followed by the health facilities and their periodic review. It can impose fines for non-compliance of the provision of the draft.

As per the draft, applicants need to provide information viz, establishment details, types of service, system of medicine, etc while registering their establishments. They can send required documents to concerned registration authorities online or can submit it to them physically. The draft also lays down the minimum standards of facilities and services, the minimum requirement of personnel, provisions for maintenance of records and reporting.

Unlike the Central government's Clinical Establishments (Registration and Regulation) Act, 2010, the draft Bill has not fixed rate of various treatments but clinical establishments are required to put up rates of various treatments at the reception, he informed.

Source: Pharmabiz