The district administration has identified a five-acre plot of land near Nidige on the outskirts of the city to set up a super-speciality hospital of the Employees’ State Insurance Corporation (ESIC).
The hospital has been a long-standing demand of workers in the district. Around 76,000 workers in Shivamogga are enrolled under ESIC. At present, the district has five dispensaries of ESIC — three in Shivamogga city and one each in Bhadravathi and Sagar — where outpatient treatment and consultation services are provided. Workers with serious health problems are referred to private hospitals empanelled with ESIC.
B.Y. Raghavendra, MP for Shivamogga, said ESIC had written to the district administration in December 2017 seeking a plot with good connectivity for the establishment of the hospital. Revenue Minister R.V. Deshpande also spoken to the Shivamogga Deputy Commissioner in this regard recently. The district administration has now identified land in survey number 25 for the purpose.
The proposed hospital will have a capacity of 100 beds and will have cardiac care, trauma care, neurology, and nephrology units. Construction work on the hospital is expected to commence as soon as the formalities on handing over the land to ESIC have been completed, the MP added.