Maternal Death Review not conducted in Telangana: CAG
By Express News Service | Published: 30th March 2018 05:06 AM |
Last Updated: 30th March 2018 05:06 AM | A+A A- |
he Comptroller and Auditor General report has observed that review of 246 maternal deaths was not carried out by Telangana health facilities
HYDERABAD: The Comptroller and Auditor General report has observed that review of 246 maternal deaths was not carried out by health facilities and that quality of obstetric care was not ensured in Telangana. It States that of the 1375 maternal deaths that occurred in the State during 2013-17, 1129 deaths were stated to have been reviewed.
“However, the review of 246 deaths was not carried out by the health facilities. In the three sampled districts (Warangal, Nalgonda, Medak), review of 151 out of 310 maternal deaths was not carried out. Specific reasons for non-conduct of MDR in the State was not furnished,” the report said.
It observed that the information on measures that need to be adopted to fill the gaps in service could not be identified as MDR was not conducted. However, the State government in their reply in January-2018 stated that since State Quality Assurance Unit has been formed, MDR would be henceforth regularly conducted. Though Maternal Mortality Rate was satisfactory at State level, high MMR of 152, 99 and 98 per 1 lakh live births was reported in tribal districts Adilabad, Khammam and Mahbubnagar respectively.
The report attributed high MMR in the three districts to non-availability of outreach Reproductive and Child Health (RCH) services. The government in January 2018 has stated that levels of Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) in Telangana got reduced from 35 per 1000 live births in 2014 to 28 in 2017. However, the IMR target under National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) by 2017 was 25 per 1000 live births. The situation might improve due to ‘102 Amma Vodi Vehicles’ and other schemes .
Why people switch to private hospitals?
‘Quality of health care was not given adequate attention thereby forcing the patients to go to private institutions for treatment’-this is one of the important observations in the report. Some of the reasons for the observations are as follows:
100% shortfall in availability of male health workers in Sub Centres (SC)
44% of 81 SCs, which were test checked, had no water facility, 27% had no power supply
126 CHCs available against requirement of 180
