In order to streamline and standardise the allied medical education in the country, the Union health ministry will soon take initiatives under which all paramedical studies in the country will be brought under a single regulatory body.  In this direction, the ministry will form a National Board of Allied Health Services by the year-end as a facilitator.

This was announced recently by Vishwas Mehta, joint secretary in the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, while addressing a two-day conference on Allied Health Professionals and their importance in the role of healthcare services at the Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences (AIMS), Kochi.

Mehta said that a national task force set up by the health ministry with experts from all over the country would decide the curriculum for various courses that would be brought under the bracket of allied health services.

He said that there are about 130 courses that follow different course schedules and different curriculum in about thousand institutions and the task force would first focus on ten courses that would soon get a proper guideline and curriculum. Allied courses related to ophthalmology, rehabilitation, medical lab technology, audiology, dental assistance, surgery and anaesthesia are among the subjects that will get immediate attention.

Kavitha Narayan, Project Director of National Initiative for Allied Health Sciences (NIAHS) said the recommendation of the task force would be to conduct these courses in medical colleges or institutes affiliated to tertiary-level medical care. She said the course would be offered in five different levels certificate course, diploma, degree, post-graduation and doctoral levels. However, she said that without clinical exposure, the courses would not meet international quality norms.

Earlier in its report submitted to the union health ministry, the NIAHS had pointed out that a considerable regulatory gap in the allied health space is attributed to the lack of a comprehensive regulatory framework and absence of centres for excellence or apex bodies for professional development and training of AHPs.  A number of councils such as the Medical Council of India (MCI), Dental Council of India (DCI) to name a few, have already been established by government of India for regulating the standards of education and training, as well as the registration of practitioners in respective fields.  The aim is to prevent unqualified people from practicing and also for maintain the standards of these professions.

However, there is no central regulatory mechanism for AHPs. As these councils are established by an Act, it is recommended to set up a National Board for Allied Health Sciences as an interim measure to undertake the work of capacity augmentation and re-organization for this group of the healthcare workforce, the NIAHS in its report to the ministry had recommended.