29 July, Srinagar: On Saturday, Chief Secretary Arun Kumar Mehta requested that all residents of Jammu and Kashmir be screened for non-communicable diseases (NCDs), including as high blood pressure, diabetes, and common malignancies.
In a statement released here, an official spokesman said that while presiding over a meeting to review the performance of the National Health Mission (NHM), the chief secretary stated that because NCDs are a major cause of death worldwide, early detection of these conditions can improve prevention and treatment.
He requested setting up camps all throughout J&K to undertake free population screenings.
Mehta further noted that while institutional births were above the national norm, there was still room for improvement.
He also stressed the need to raise J&K’s position in the SDGs for health. The chief secretary requested that the department digitalize all patient health records so that they could be accessed anywhere using their ABHA identifiers. He also suggested that they be allowed to contribute their earlier recordings to it so that it might be preserved for future generations.
Mehta asked the officials about the outdated equipment and poorly maintained infrastructure at the hospitals in J&K.
He suggested that the department develop a strategy to fix all of these devices and enhance the infrastructure so that it may be used to the greatest extent possible for the good of the populace.
The department’s system for screening J&K minors was requested by the chief secretary.
He instructed them to go to distant schools and anganwadic centre to screen the youngsters who were enrolled there.
Mehta gave the interested parties the order to provide every aid to children in need of medical care and to spread awareness so that parents would be willing to have their children screened at a young age.
He also emphasised the need of rating all of J&K’s medical facilities according to a set of criteria, starting with the sub-centers.
In order for people to judge for themselves the condition of these health facilities and to give them the chance to make adjustments, the chief secretary instructed them to repeat the exercise on a regular basis and make the results available to the public.
He also requested that information be spread about programmes like e-Sanjeevani, e-Sahaj, and Tele-MANAS so that individuals may use these IT and telecommunication technologies from the comfort of their homes to get help, advice, and assistance.
Secretary of Health Bhupinder Kumar gave the gathering an overview of how the NHM functions in this area by stating that all persons 30 years of age or under have been registered in the NCD portal.
