Tamil Nadu to create 4 Regional Directors of Medical Education and Research posts
Chennai: The Tamil Nadu government plans to establish four posts of Regional Directors of Medical Education and Research to strengthen the administration and supervision of medical colleges across the state, Health Minister K.G. Arunraj announced on Friday. Currently, the state has only one Director of Medical Education and Research (DME), whose office is based in Chennai.
Addressing media persons at the Government Institute of Child Health and Hospital for Children, where he inaugurated an extracorporeal photopheresis unit, in which white blood cells are treated outside the body and infused back into the patient, Arunraj said the government had come up with the plan to create the posts and decentralise powers after consultations and discussions with government doctors’ associations, reports The New Indian Express.
Arunraj explained that the growing number of medical colleges had made administrative decentralisation necessary. The government sector alone currently operates 36 medical colleges, increasing the responsibilities of the existing DME.
The proposed Regional Directors will hold positions senior to college deans but below the state DME. Certain administrative powers currently exercised by the DME will be delegated to the regional directors, while some responsibilities presently held by the government will be assigned to the DME, the Minister added.
The government, with the help of several organisations, has been adopting some steps to improve healthcare. A few days ago, at the Egmore Government Children’s Welfare Hospital in Chennai, an Extracorporeal Photopheresis (External Blood Light Treatment) machine, worth Rs 83.50 lakh, was donated for the Advanced Haematology and Cancer Transplant Centre.
The Hemodialysis Centre, formed by the joint efforts of Rotary Associations and Pushpavati Babulal Kamdar Charitable Trust at Government Suburban Hospital, Chennai, was also inaugurated recently.
