Telangana government focuses on quaternary healthcare

This is the first time in Telangana that the State government is in the process of developing dedicated quaternary hospital beds in government hospitals

Hyderabad: To provide poor patients access to the highest level of medical care that solely focuses on the treatment of very complex and rare medical conditions, the Telangana government in the past 12 months has launched concerted efforts to create quaternary medical facilities that are next-level to the existing tertiary care services.

This is the first time in Telangana that the State government is in the process of developing dedicated quaternary hospital beds in government hospitals. Since developing such medical facilities involves creating high-end medical infrastructure and having super-specialists, these are expected to be a reality in the coming years.

---

Since quaternary healthcare facilities are usually considered as an extension of tertiary care, the Health Department is planning to create at least 10,000 beds in government hospitals in and around Hyderabad so that poor patients need not seek treatment in corporate hospitals.

Quaternary care and to some extent even tertiary care are highly advanced healthcare facilities and include complex surgeries, organ transplantation, life-saving neurosurgery procedures, cardiac surgeries, plastic surgeries, genetic diagnostics, ICU, palliative care, experimental surgical interventions, etc.

Such super-specialty hospital beds will be available at the upcoming centralised transplantation centre at Gandhi Hospital, a few at Osmania General Hospital, upcoming new medical block at ENT Hospital in Koti, upcoming new state-of-the-art block of Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS), three upcoming Telangana Institute of Medical Sciences (TIMS) and Research Centres in Saroornagar, Erragadda, Alwal and health city in Warangal.

Realising the need to promote research, which is a vital part of quaternary healthcare, the Telangana government has planned to develop new super-specialty facilities in line with PGI Chandigarh, AIIMS, New Delhi, IITs, and IIMs. As a part of these efforts, the TIMS Act, 2023 was passed in the recent Assembly session.

All the TIMS healthcare facilities will have autonomous status, which is already the case with the NIMS Hospital in Punjagutta. Similar autonomous high-end healthcare facilities are already in place in several States including Sanjay Gandhi PG Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGI) in Lucknow and SVIMS in Tirupati.

These facilities will come directly under Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao, as he will be the president of all the TIMS and will also be the Chancellor, a move that will definitely have an impact on the overall healthcare services.