Architha Aithal | Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (original) (raw)

Papers by Architha Aithal

World is facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers. ... more World is facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers. Despite of many trained health care professionals our health care system is struggling to provide optimum services to the patients. Gaps still exist with respect to patient care, which are unevenly delivered. The data collected from 228 subjects reveals that only 7.01% of the subjects have received counseling always, 59.65% think that counseling should be given and only 41.66% are satisfied with current health care system while 56.57% are not satisfied. Our study shows that there is a huge burden on health care professionals due to a high number of the patient load which leads to the hindrance in optimum patient care and finally leads to the degradation in the quality of health care services. Now time has approached when the term task shifting should be taken seriously especially in the health care sectors. Pharmacists, an ignored profession in the health care sector have a crucial role for optimum patient care. It is the demand of the scenario that pharmacist should be taken as a key role player between the patient and prescriber. A proper communication between the patient and prescriber can be established only if all health care professionals will start working to assist each other not to compete with each other.

Many developing countries are facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortag... more Many developing countries are facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers. Despite of many trained health care professionals our health care system is struggling to provide optimum services to the patients. Gaps still exist with respect to patient care, which are unevenly delivered. The data collected from 228 subjects reveals that only 7.01% of the subjects have received counseling always, 59.65% think that counseling should be given and only 41.66% are satisfied with current health care system while 56.57% are not satisfied. Our study shows that there is a huge burden on health care professionals due to a high number of the patient load which leads to the hindrance in optimum patient care and finally leads to the degradation in the quality of health care services. Now time has approached when the term task shifting should be taken seriously especially in the health care sectors. Pharmacists, an ignored profession in the health care sector have a crucial role for optimum patient care. It is the demand of the scenario that pharmacist should be taken as a key role player between the patient and prescriber. A proper communication between the patient and prescriber can be established only if all health care professionals will start working to assist each other not to compete with each other.

Conference Presentations by Architha Aithal

World is facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers.... more World is facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers. The shortage is compounded by a high burden of infectious diseases; emigration of trained professionals; difficult working conditions and low motivation. For example, the burden of HIV/AIDS has led to the concept of task shifting being increasingly promoted as a way of rapidly expanding human resource capacity. This refers to the delegation of medical and health service responsibilities from higher to lower cadres of health staff, in some cases nonprofessionals. Gaps still exist with respect to health programmes, which are unevenly delivered, with rural areas being particularly under-serviced; insufficient support for health care in health care services; and irregular and inconsistent identification and treatment of more common communicable diseases such as depression and anxiety disorders.The World Health Organization advocates task-shifting, the process of delegating clinical care functions from more specialized to less specialized health workers, as a strategy to achieve the United Nations Millennium Development Goals2.

The acute shortage of professionally qualified healthcare workers in developing countries is crea... more The acute shortage of professionally qualified healthcare workers in developing countries is creating big problem in providing quality and timely health services to the needy people. Despite of many trained health care professionals our health care system is struggling to provide optimum services to the patients. This shortage is compounded by a high burden of infectious diseases, emigration of trained professionals, difficult working conditions, and low motivation by country governments. Even though, the permanent solution to this problem is to create more professional doctors by increasing training courses, training facilities through modifying government policies and enhancing resources to do so. But such actions and resultant solutions take long time to realize in practice. Hence a quick optimum solution is needed to address the critical shortage of trained healthcare professionals. Out of many alternatives, the best alternative for health care executives in any hospital of primary health centres is the strategic decision of thinking and implementing so called strategy of task-shifting. Task-shifting is a management strategy in which the clinical care responsibilities are transferred from more specialized professionals to less specialized health workers through proper delegation. This delegation of tasks from one cadre to another, previously often called substitution, is not a new concept. It has been used in many countries and for many decades, either as requirements to emergency needs or as a method to provide adequate healthcare service at primary and secondary levels, especially in rural and urban health centres with understaffed facilities, and also to enhance quality and reduce costs. In this paper we have studied the quality and satisfaction of patient counselling through empirical study. The data collected from 228 subjects reveals that only 7.01% of the subjects have received counselling always, 59.65% think that counselling should be given and only 41.66% are satisfied with current health care system while 56.57% are not satisfied. Our study shows that there is a huge burden on health care professionals due to a high number of the patient load which leads to the hindrance in optimum patient care and finally leads to the degradation in the quality of health care services. Now time has approached when the term task-shifting should be taken seriously especially in the health care sectors. Now time has approached when the term task-shifting should be taken seriously especially in the health care sectors. Pharmacists and Physiotherapists the ignored professions in the health care sector have a crucial role for optimum patient care through accepting the responsibilities of task-shifting. It is the demand of the scenario that para-medical professionals should be taken as a key role player between the patient and prescriber to address the shortage. A proper communication between the patient and prescriber can be established only if all health care professionals shall start working to assist each other instead of competes with each other.

World is facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers. ... more World is facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers. Despite of many trained health care professionals our health care system is struggling to provide optimum services to the patients. Gaps still exist with respect to patient care, which are unevenly delivered. The data collected from 228 subjects reveals that only 7.01% of the subjects have received counseling always, 59.65% think that counseling should be given and only 41.66% are satisfied with current health care system while 56.57% are not satisfied. Our study shows that there is a huge burden on health care professionals due to a high number of the patient load which leads to the hindrance in optimum patient care and finally leads to the degradation in the quality of health care services. Now time has approached when the term task shifting should be taken seriously especially in the health care sectors. Pharmacists, an ignored profession in the health care sector have a crucial role for optimum patient care. It is the demand of the scenario that pharmacist should be taken as a key role player between the patient and prescriber. A proper communication between the patient and prescriber can be established only if all health care professionals will start working to assist each other not to compete with each other.

Many developing countries are facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortag... more Many developing countries are facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers. Despite of many trained health care professionals our health care system is struggling to provide optimum services to the patients. Gaps still exist with respect to patient care, which are unevenly delivered. The data collected from 228 subjects reveals that only 7.01% of the subjects have received counseling always, 59.65% think that counseling should be given and only 41.66% are satisfied with current health care system while 56.57% are not satisfied. Our study shows that there is a huge burden on health care professionals due to a high number of the patient load which leads to the hindrance in optimum patient care and finally leads to the degradation in the quality of health care services. Now time has approached when the term task shifting should be taken seriously especially in the health care sectors. Pharmacists, an ignored profession in the health care sector have a crucial role for optimum patient care. It is the demand of the scenario that pharmacist should be taken as a key role player between the patient and prescriber. A proper communication between the patient and prescriber can be established only if all health care professionals will start working to assist each other not to compete with each other.

World is facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers.... more World is facing a crisis in human health resources due to a critical shortage of health workers. The shortage is compounded by a high burden of infectious diseases; emigration of trained professionals; difficult working conditions and low motivation. For example, the burden of HIV/AIDS has led to the concept of task shifting being increasingly promoted as a way of rapidly expanding human resource capacity. This refers to the delegation of medical and health service responsibilities from higher to lower cadres of health staff, in some cases nonprofessionals. Gaps still exist with respect to health programmes, which are unevenly delivered, with rural areas being particularly under-serviced; insufficient support for health care in health care services; and irregular and inconsistent identification and treatment of more common communicable diseases such as depression and anxiety disorders.The World Health Organization advocates task-shifting, the process of delegating clinical care functions from more specialized to less specialized health workers, as a strategy to achieve the United Nations Millennium Development Goals2.

The acute shortage of professionally qualified healthcare workers in developing countries is crea... more The acute shortage of professionally qualified healthcare workers in developing countries is creating big problem in providing quality and timely health services to the needy people. Despite of many trained health care professionals our health care system is struggling to provide optimum services to the patients. This shortage is compounded by a high burden of infectious diseases, emigration of trained professionals, difficult working conditions, and low motivation by country governments. Even though, the permanent solution to this problem is to create more professional doctors by increasing training courses, training facilities through modifying government policies and enhancing resources to do so. But such actions and resultant solutions take long time to realize in practice. Hence a quick optimum solution is needed to address the critical shortage of trained healthcare professionals. Out of many alternatives, the best alternative for health care executives in any hospital of primary health centres is the strategic decision of thinking and implementing so called strategy of task-shifting. Task-shifting is a management strategy in which the clinical care responsibilities are transferred from more specialized professionals to less specialized health workers through proper delegation. This delegation of tasks from one cadre to another, previously often called substitution, is not a new concept. It has been used in many countries and for many decades, either as requirements to emergency needs or as a method to provide adequate healthcare service at primary and secondary levels, especially in rural and urban health centres with understaffed facilities, and also to enhance quality and reduce costs. In this paper we have studied the quality and satisfaction of patient counselling through empirical study. The data collected from 228 subjects reveals that only 7.01% of the subjects have received counselling always, 59.65% think that counselling should be given and only 41.66% are satisfied with current health care system while 56.57% are not satisfied. Our study shows that there is a huge burden on health care professionals due to a high number of the patient load which leads to the hindrance in optimum patient care and finally leads to the degradation in the quality of health care services. Now time has approached when the term task-shifting should be taken seriously especially in the health care sectors. Now time has approached when the term task-shifting should be taken seriously especially in the health care sectors. Pharmacists and Physiotherapists the ignored professions in the health care sector have a crucial role for optimum patient care through accepting the responsibilities of task-shifting. It is the demand of the scenario that para-medical professionals should be taken as a key role player between the patient and prescriber to address the shortage. A proper communication between the patient and prescriber can be established only if all health care professionals shall start working to assist each other instead of competes with each other.