Govt should look at increasing nursing seats: Apollo Hospitals' JMD Sangita Reddy

New Delhi, Sep 21 (PTI) The government should look at increasing the number of nursing seats in the country in order to enhance healthcare access, Apollo Hospitals Joint Managing Director Sangita Reddy said on Wednesday.

Speaking to PTI on the sidelines of a FICCI event here, she noted that the number of medical colleges has already been enhanced and increase in the nursing seats would lead to further strengthening of the country's healthcare system.

"We are very appreciative of the steps the government is taking in the field of healthcare. Our one pending big request is nursing. We need nurse practitioners and we should look at doubling the input in every nursing college," Reddy said.

For example, a nursing college having an approval for 40 seats should be allowed to enhance the seats to 80, she added.

"Let them (colleges) run two shifts but we need more nurses in the world," Reddy stated.

Speaking about the importance of digital initiatives like telemedicine, she said it is a huge enabler for people living in remote and far flung places looking for accessible and affordable healthcare.

"People need to travel to large cities to meet doctors to even make the simplest of diagnosis... we  (Apollo Hospitals) started telemedicine in 2000 and very early in the journey we understood that 83 per cent of scenarios could be taken care of  in the rural areas if some diagnostic capability is there," Reddy said.

She said Apollo Healthcare is now the fastest growing healthcare app in the country and is poised for further growth.

Speaking at the event, National Health Authority CEO R S Sharma said the building blocks of digital health are ready with various initiatives in place.

"Now what is required, however, is that the service providers (hospitals) start creating digital records..they should start using digital technology...while big hospital chains are doing it... smaller hospitals need to do it as well," he stated. PTI MSS ABM ABM