State appoints 581 new doctors to breathe life into health services

Bhubaneswar: Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Monday inducted 581 new doctors for providing quality healthcare services to the people of the state.
Addressing a function at Rabindra Mandap here, the Chief Minister congratulated the newly-recruited doctors and said that this is by far the highest number of doctors to join at one go.
“Healthcare is a top priority for the state government. Availability of doctors is the basic minimum requirement for providing quality healthcare services. We have successfully introduced a placement-based incentive system which has resulted in a sharp decline in the vacancies of doctors in remote and difficult areas. To attract doctors to the state medical service, we have taken a number of other initiatives like the restructuring of medical service cadre, introduction of a transparent transfer policy, additional weightage in PG examination for doctors working in far-off areas, etc. Besides, we have introduced a corpus fund for KBK and KBK Plus districts for hiring, accommodation and transportation of healthcare providers. These initiatives have yielded encouraging results in remote areas, especially in Nabarangpur, Malkangiri and Gajapati districts,” he said.
Highlighting that more than 150 posts of dental surgeons have been filled up, Naveen said the government is planning to recruit another 266 dentists this year. Besides filling up more than 5,700 posts of paramedics, 169 homoeopathic and 50 ayurvedic doctors would be appointed in the state, he added.
The meeting was attended by Health Minister Pratap Jena, Secretary P K Meherda and Health Mission Director Salini Pandit.