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Friday, 26 October 2012

Homoeopaths, physios, nurses queuing up for BPO jobs


Dabur may have taken ayurveda global, corporatising and then coasting on the traditional healthcare system to a potential multi-billion-dollar business, but ayurvedic practitioners in India — and others of their ilk, such as homoeopaths, nurses and physiotherapists — are flocking to healthcare-related business process outsourcing firms, or BPOs, doubling up as specialists in analytics and medical transcription.
Take Bangalore-based ayurvedic doctor Monika Kumar, whose routine today is typical of any BPO employee’s – shift-based work, taking calls, feeding data to computers and so on.
But Kumar is happy. She switched careers ten years ago as BPO work promised a stable salary, growth prospects and opportunities to work on a global platform, something that eluded her when she worked as an ayurvedic doctor for two years after graduating from the Government Ayurvedic College in Madhya Pradesh. Besides, BPO work engaged her in creating electronic health records, a task that allowed her to remain in touch with her expertise.
And this is not a case in isolation. The assistant principal of a science college in Coimbatore along with 17 of her former physiotherapy students recently queued up before a healthcare BPO in Bangalore seeking jobs. Again for similar reasons: limited opportunities in their areas of expertise and growing potential of healthcare outsourcing.
Monthly salaries at medical BPO firms start in the range of Rs8,000-15,000 and can zoom to Rs30,000-40,000 in three years.
Small wonder a number of graduates in life sciences, medicine, zoology, botany, microbiology, nursing, homeopathy and physiotherapy now feel compelled to migrate towards BPOs engaged in analytical and voice-based work, medical transcriptions, electronic health records, medical coding and patient charts.
“Very often, people do not get the right kind of breaks in their respective areas of expertise,” said Sanjay Shanmugaum, vice-president of human resources at M*Modal Global Services, a medical transcriptions firm.
“Jobs in a healthcare BPO are therefore seen as an alternative career,” said Gopi Natarajan, CEO of Bangalore-based Omega Healthcare, a firm providing medical coding and voice-based services to the US healthcare industry, which saves up to 60% on costs by outsourcing such work.
To be sure, most of the BPO clients are from the US.
Industry estimates suggest the US healthcare market will likely outsource BPO-related work to the tune of $14-18 billion in the next few years.
India could potentially garner around $4.5-5 billion of that business, up from the current $400 million, say experts.
The new US healthcare law piloted by President Obama, which is expected to bring 30 million more Americans under medical insurance, is seen adding to the sector’s prospects.
In fact, industry estimates suggest that by 2015-16, about 1 lakh new medical BPO jobs will be created every year, up from the current 18,000.
Experts say more projects related to data conversion, management of electronic health records, claims processing, verifications, so on, will likely be outsourced to Indian BPO firms in the years to come.
The industry has started gearing up in anticipation.
For instance, Omega, which has around 4,000 employees, is looking to add 150-180 a month from now on.
Similarly, M*Modal has around 6,000 employees whose backgrounds are in fields like radiology, medicine, life sciences and pharmacy. According to Shanmugaum, about 100 new staff are added every month.
“The potential is humongous,” said Natarajan of Omega. “The sector is growing at 30-35%.”

Thursday, 18 October 2012

‘Fraud’ in NRHM selections















 A probe into the selections made under the National Rural Health Mission in central Kashmir’s Budgam district has revealed that those selected are “dubious degree holders from unrecognized institutions.”  Soon after the selection list of NRHM (ISM) doctors and pharmacists for district Budgam appeared in local dailies last month, the unsuccessful candidates raised certain objections about the genuineness of the appointments after which the Commissioner/Secretary Health and Medical Education MK Dwivedi ordered an inquiry into the selection process. The list was issued vide no. CMOB/NRHM/12/3042-47 dated 12/09/2012  The inquiry report prepared by the Director Indian System of Medicine Dr Abdul Kabir Dar revealed that most of the selected candidates including ISM doctors have acquired their degrees from “unrecognized” or “temporarily registered” institutions while those having degrees from recognized institutions have been dropped.  “Out of 10 candidates selected as ISM pharmacists, eight have obtained their Ayurvedic Compounder Certificates from Vinayaka Mission University, Tamil Naidu through a Jammu based Madre-e-Meherban Institute of Health Sciences which is not recognized by state government for such courses,” the report said.  The report has been corroborated by official documents wherein the Assistant Director, ISM has informed the Commissioner Secretary that Mader-e-Meherban Institute had “neither produced any documentary evidence regarding permissions/NOC of the state government for conducting such courses nor any other institutions or universities offering such ‘Ayurvedic Compounder’ diploma is recognized by the competent authority”.  “Even the nomenclature on the certificates does not conform to that of the Department,” the documents read.  The documents reveal that soon after the disclosures, the Madr-e-Meherban Institute filed a petition against the State Government “seeking inter-alia directions to recognize the degrees/diplomas issued Vinayak Mission University and IASE University, Rajasthan conferred upon the candidates undergoing Paramedical courses from the petitioner institute in view of affiliation with the (above mentioned) universities.” The Court has asked the department to look into the genuineness of the degrees certificates submitted by the students from institutes like the Madr-e-Meherban Institute.  Pertinently, a number of district health societies have issued advertisements for


appointments under the NRHM. However, the advertisement notifications, according to sources, have been issued with dubious nomenclature aimed at benefitting unrecognized institutions.”  In one such notification the CMO Budgam uses a wrong nomenclature and skips the genuine statutory body in the requisite qualification column.  For pharmacist posts the notice invites applications from “Compounder/pharmacist having diploma in Homeopathy/Ayurvedic/Unani from the institutes recognized by the GOI or certificates course recognized by statutory body constitutional by J&K Govt”.  “It is vague terminology used in the notifications,” said a senior health official. “The right term used is ISM pharmacist recognized by the Central Council of Indian Medicine (CCIM), an analogous body of MCI.”  Pertinently after the probe report, the Vice-Chairman of District Health Society Budgam Dr Aleemudin has been attached.  According to the probe report, the society headed by the District Development Commissioner (DDC) with Chief Medical Officer as its vice chairman “bypassed the expert panel of ISM and NRHM while giving final nod to the selections.” It said the two members, one each of ISM and NHRM, didn’t sign the final award/merit list and despite this it was issued to press.