The Sehat Ghar: An Innovation to Improve Primary Healthcare in Rural Punjab

Abstract

An effective healthcare sector essentially relies on a strong primary healthcare system. The primary healthcare system governs all major aspects of preventive healthcare and family planning services including immunization, hygiene, communicable disease prevention, sanitation, etc. In addition to this, a major bottleneck limiting the quality of healthcare at secondary and tertiary health facilities is the very high patient footfall that these hospitals. The primary healthcare facilities are designed to be the first tier of facility that a patient falls onto, and hence is either treated there or referred to higher level facilities by screening and limiting patient flow to next levels. Supporting this tier hence helps reduce burden on secondary and tertiary facilities of patients that could have been treated at primary facilities and hence exponentially improve the quality of health services in these lager hospitals. The document discusses some of the major issues faced by the primary healthcare sector in Punjab. These issues were studied and analyzed in detail at South Punjab Health Department, which is an arm of the provincial health department governing 11 districts of Southern Punjab – districts where socio-economic conditions are generally much poorer than the rest of Punjab. This document discusses the initiative of Sehat Ghar, its model, potential to ensure basic health services delivery to the local population and its direct & indirect contribution to tackle major issues of primary healthcare in Punjab.