CM approves creating 150 new jobs at NICH

The Sindh government announced on Monday that they will establish satellite centres of the National Institute of Child Health (NICH) in all the divisional headquarters of the province, with the first of the centres to be set up in Mirpurkhas.

“I want the NICH to be run like the NICVD (National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases) by an independent board of directors,” Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said while presiding over a high-level meeting regarding the expansion of services of the child hospital to other cities.

The Sindh government decided to expand the health services of three leading Karachi hospitals — the NICH, the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre and the NICVD — after the federal health authorities asked the provincial administration to continue managing these facilities, both financially and administratively.

Chairing the meeting at the CM House to resolve all the outstanding issues of the NICH, Shah said he has decided to establish satellite centres of the NICH in all the divisional headquarters.

He said that in the first phase a satellite centre will be established in Mirpurkhas to facilitate the people of Mirpurkhas Division who have to come to Karachi for the treatment of their ailing children.

The chief executive was informed during the meeting that no fresh appointments or promotions to suitable qualified professionals have taken place since 2011. As no new equipment was purchased during the past eight years, the NICH has been facing serious problems to improve its services further, said the hospital’s director, Prof Syed Jamal Raza.

The NICH has a 1,035 sanctioned strength of medical and paramedical staff, against which 674 are working, which shows a shortfall of 361 staff members.

The CM approved promotions of 43 qualified and experienced professionals and also approved new posts of 150 medical and paramedical staff members. He directed Health Secretary Saeed Awan and Finance Secretary Najam Shah to have a meeting with the NICH director so that new positions can be created for the efficient functioning of the hospital.

CM Shah said he wanted the NICH to run on the pattern of the NICVD: under an independent board of directors, which would take care of all of the administrative and financial matters and run the satellite centres that would be established on a war footing in every divisional headquarters.

He said that the first NICH satellite centre will be established in Mirpurkhas so that it can efficiently cover the entire division, with a particular focus on Tharparkar to control the mother and child nutrition issues there.

The chief minister was told that the NICH has an old generator with lower capacity and needs an MRI machine, so he approved the purchase of a new generator and an MRI machine, directing the health department to move a summary for a formal approval.

The CM also directed the finance department to release the budget of the NICH so that it can meet all its expenditures, including equipment maintenance and medicines. The NICH is a 500-bed hospital, and the chief executive ordered its director to submit a detailed plan for its expansion.

It was pointed out that the NICH has limited staff accommodation facilities, and that most of the houses are occupied by unauthorised people, following which the CM directed Chief Secretary Mumtaz Shah to get the NICH staff accommodation cleared of unauthorised people through the district administration.

The CM reiterated his commitment to providing the best medical facilities to each and every child of the province. The meeting was also attended by CM’s adviser Murtaza Wahab, CM’s Principal Secretary Sajid Jamal Abro and CM’s Additional Secretary Fayaz Jatoi among others.