The National Accreditation Board for Hospital and Healthcare (NABH) is planning to prepare separate standards for the medium or small hospitals. The accreditation process of the new standard is almost same from the earlier standard. The new accreditation standard is nearing the completion stage and by the end of October it will go to the technical committee for the accreditation.

Speaking to Pharmabiz, Dr Bhupendra Kumar Rana, director, NABH said, "Considering the health issues and medical treatments in the rural and urban middle class families, we are in the process to sketch out separate standard for the medium or small hospitals. India's almost 80 per cent patients are still approaching medium and small hospitals".

As of now, "We have not yet planned the bed capacity for the new standard, but we are bearing in mind basic accessibility of the hospital. We may make compulsory to 50 beds facility or less then 50 beds also, but hospital should be having cardiovascular, neurological and orthopaedic super specialty at their hospitals," Rana further commented

At present seven hospitals from New Delhi, Mumbai, Kerala and Kolkatta in the country have implemented NABH standards. NABH has received 41 new accreditation applications. Out of seven accredited hospitals, three are from New Delhi which include Max Super Speciality Hospital, Max Devaki Devi Heart and Vascular Institute and Moolchand Hospital. Two hospitals from Kerala namely Malabar Institute of Medical Sciences Ltd (MIMS) at Kozhikode and Kerala Institute of Medical Science (KIMS) at Triuvananthapuram and B M Birla Heart Research Centre in Kolkata and Dr L H Hiranandani, Mumbai has become the first hospital in the western India to receive the NABH certification for the quality of patients care.