Maharashtra: Giving doctors incentives turns healthcare around in Maoist-affected areas
Facing acute crisis of doctors in rural areas, the Maharashtra government decided to allow professionals to negotiate their salaries and also added incentives. Since the scheme was announced six months ago, the government has appointed 356 specialists, mostly in areas affected by Maoists. And things are slowly turning around. This scheme has proven to be a win-win situation for both doctors and patients.
To curb vacancies, government announced incentives for doctors
The Maharashtra government noted that 64% of 648 posts for anaesthetists, 35% of 561 paediatrician posts, and 26% of 612 gynaecologists posts were vacant till October last year. To curb this, the government announced incentives. So, doctors started getting Rs. 4000, Rs. 40, Rs. 1500 and Rs. 1200 for a Caesarean surgery, ante-natal check-up, assisted delivery and pediatric case respectively. The appointments' number increased.
Riding on scheme's success, government plans to expand it
As a result, Pune got 70 specialists, Satara, Chandrapur and Yawatamal got 39, 28 and 24 respectively. Riding on this success, the government plans to expand this salary negotiation deal to other specialities like ENT, dermatology, and general surgery. Earlier, doctors earned somewhere between Rs. 50,000 to Rs. 90,000, depending on their experience, but now they can earn as much as private doctors.
Incentives above salaries get approval from doctors too
This idea of incentives seems to be working for doctors too. Dr Taral Nagmoti, a gynaecologist in Brahmapuri, said she earned Rs. 5.2 lakh in incentives since December 2017. Dr Priti Bambole, who works at Maoist-affected area, said she earned Rs. 2 lakh over her fixed salary. She added since doctors get incentives, they don't feel they are working overtime.
Notably, in some areas money isn't the only driving force
The prominent result of this scheme was that in Beed, women turning to private sector for delivery dropped from 40 to 20%. While money has become the important factor for doctors to turn up in some areas, it hasn't been able to compel them to work in areas like Nandurbar, Thane, Sindhudurg, Ratnagiri, Jalna and Bhandara. Not just money, they want better infrastructure.
