Centre grants 265 DNB seats to hospitals in 20 J&K dists

FIFTY PER CENT OF THE POSTGRADUATE SEATS WILL BE RESERVED FOR LOCAL IN-SERVICE DOCTORS, THE UNION HEALTH MINISTRY SAID IN A STATEMENT

NEW DELHI: The Centre on Tuesday granted 265 Diplomate of National Board (DNB) postgraduate medical seats to several government hospitals across 20 districts in the Union territory of Jammu and Kashmir, in line with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision of “Health for All”.

Fifty per cent of the postgraduate seats will be reserved for local in-service doctors to provide them with the opportunity for postgraduate training, the Union health ministry said in a statement. The step will not only benefit people of Jammu and Kashmir, but the doctors there will also get an opportunity of being trained in their own region, it said, adding that the Centre is also of the view that tapping into the homegrown medical workforce would lead to an effective healthcare delivery system in the UT. “With the vision of providing trained specialists in almost every district of Jammu and Kashmir, the Government of India took this as a challenge in a mission mode,” read the statement.

“The Ministry of Health along with National Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences (NBEMS) took a lead role and ensured that several postgraduate seats of NBEMS are granted to various government hospitals of Jammu and Kashmir,” it said.

As a consequence, the ministry said, at present there exist more than 250 postgraduate seats across 20 districts, which is the phase 1 of the expansion plan. Two more PG seats will be granted in the second phase.

Jammu and Kashmir currently has 156 DNB broad speciality postgraduate medical seats, according to the NBEMS website. DBN is a postgraduate degree same as MD/MS degree awarded to the specialist doctors in India after completion of three-year residency.

“The people of Jammu and Kashmir will be benefited as modern quality health care will become more affordable and accessible in almost all the districts,” read the statement. “This in turn, would further enance the quality of primary, secondary, and tertiary healthcare.”

The Centre has also increased the number of examination centres in the UT to ensure that the candidates do not have to travel to other states to appear in the entrance examinations.

The union minister of health and family welfare Dr Mansukh Mandaviya also uploaded two tweets regarding grant of DNB seats of J&K. Mandaviya tweets “PM Narendra Modi Ji’s Govt has granted 265 DNB Post-Graduate medical seats across 20 district Govt hospitals in J&K. I appreciate Team NBE for accomplishing this tremendous work.”