Share patients’ data: Health dept to pvt hospitals

The department of health and family welfare has asked private hospitals to enter data on the services they have rendered on a monthly basis.

The move comes as a way to create a better reporting system. The health department and the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike have in the past complained that private hospitals have not been providing accurate and timely data, hindering public health policy discussions.

Senior BBMP officials said the department has given user IDs and passwords to 30 private hospitals to let them directly feed data into its Health Management and Information System. These are medical college hospitals or those with over 100 beds.

Dr Kala, RCH officer, BBMP, said efforts are on to extend this to other hospitals and smaller clinics. A review meeting was held to discuss the plans.

"Bengaluru has both floating and urban residents," Dr Kala said. "The data is gathered from public and private hospitals. Many private hospitals fail to maintain records. We are told that only patient files have details."

A source has told DH that ASHA and ANM (auxiliary nurse midwife) have been asked to manually collect data from the private hospitals and feed it into the state health department's website. "There's a need to report the kind of diseases they see and the numbers. This helps us to know the disease incidence better," the source said.

Hospitals must enter the data on the number of outpatients they see, the kind of treatment provided, immunisation of children, child birth, complications in pregnant women, and maternal and infant mortality, among others.

Dr Kala said the department gives an incentive of Rs 500 to private practitioners reporting tuberculosis cases, besides offering them free drugs that they could give to the patient.