Chandigarh, Jul 21 (PTI) Punjab Health Minister Balbir Singh on Friday extended an invitation to the corporate hospitals to collaborate with the government to provide quality healthcare services to people at subsidised and affordable prices.

"The government will only take the services of doctors, leading lights of healthcare providers and corporate hospitals at government health institutions to overcome the deficiency of super specialist services," the minister said, adding that the collaboration will be managed and funded by the government.

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He said that this initiative will also help in improving the healthcare services in medically under-served districts in the state.

Corporate hospitals can also help by training doctors and paramedics staff, he added. He also said that there is a lot of scope for telemedicine and artificial intelligence in the healthcare sector.

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The health minister made the remarks while presiding over an interactive session "Northern Region Roundtable on Healthcare Priorities of Punjab and the Way Forward” organised by NATHEALTH, an apex body of the healthcare stakeholders in India, at the Indian School of Business in Mohali, an official statement issued here said.

Head of corporate affairs and CSR at Fortis HealthCare Ltd Manu Kapila, Secretary General of NATHEALTH Siddhartha Bhattacharya, COO of Fortis Hospital Ashish Bhatia, were among the speakers at the occasion, as per the Punjab government statement.

The minister said the Punjab government is aiming to make medical education available for the larger section of society by making it more affordable and better in terms of quality.

He said they are focusing on strengthening the three wings of healthcare – primary, secondary and tertiary, along with establishing "CM di Yogshala" for prevention.

Singh also said the government has set up 'Aam Aadmi Clinics' and are upgrading dispensaries in the state, which are enough to ensure primary care. He added that subdivisions and districts will soon be equipped with the latest radiology machines to take care of the secondary care and people can get X-rays, ultrasound, MRI, CT Scan, done at these hospitals.

"To provide tertiary care, we are revamping all the medical colleges in the state," he added.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)