Govt mulls setting up AACs in sub-divisional, district hospitals

Move aimed at reducing patient load on specialists

- Karam Prakash

PATIALA: The Punjab government has decided to set up Aam Aadmi Clinics (ACCs) on the premises of the secondary health centres including sub-divisional and district hospitals across the state.

According to orders by the Punjab health department, issued last week, the civil surgeons in the districts have been asked to identify and propose the potential sub-divisional and district health facilities where AACs could be set up with a pre-condition that there should be no such facility within 200-300m of the hospitals.

A senior health officer, privy to the development, said the rationale behind this is to decrease specialists' patient load.

"Many districts have already proposed names of hospitals. We will now move the file for further process to build AACs," the officer said, pleading anonymity.