All about the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare?

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare primarily deals with health care, including awareness campaigns, immunisation campaigns, preventive medicine, and public health. It is also responsible for all government programs relating to family planning in India. Being a government ministry, it is headed by a cabinet minister.

Vision of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare

• Attainment of highest possible level of health and well-being for all, through preventive and promotive health care and universal access to good quality health services without anyone having to face financial hardship as a consequence.

Mission of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare

• Ensure availability of quality healthcare on equitable, accessible and affordable basis across regions and communities

• Establish comprehensive primary healthcare delivery system and well-functioning linkages with secondary and tertiary care health delivery system

• Develop the training capacity for providing human resources with adequate skill mix at all levels

• Regulate health service delivery and promote rational use of pharmaceuticals in the country

Note: All information has been sourced from the official website of Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

Departments under Health and Family Welfare

The various departments under Health and Welfare are:

• VBD Section

• Blindness Control

• Bureau of Planning

• Cancer Control Programme

• CCA

• Central Design Bureau

• CHS

• Drugs Food Quality control division

• Emergency Medical Relief

• IC & IH

• Immunization

• Medical Education

• Medical Tourism

• Mental Health Division

• National Programme For Prevention and Control of Cancer, Diabetes, Cardiovascular Disease and Stroke(NPCDCS)

• National Programme for Health Care of the Elderly NPHCE

• National Programme for Prevention and Control of Deafness (NPPCD)

• National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme

• NGO Division

• NHM Finance

• NHM policy & Planning

• NUHM

• Infrastructure & HR Division

• e-Health & Telemedicine

• Medical Education Policy - II

• Dental

• Nursing

• Allied Health Sciences(AHS)

• PMSSY

• PNDT

• Principal Accounts Office

• Training

• Procurement

• Revised National Tuberculosis Programme

• Statistics Division

• Training Division

• Activities of Health and Family Welfare

• OP & Nirodh Marketing

The Department of Family Welfare is also responsible for:

• 18 Population Research Centres (PRCs) at six universities and six other institutions across 17 states

• The National Institute of Health and Family Welfare (NIHFW), South Delhi

• International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS), Mumbai

• Central Drug Research Institute (CDRI), Lucknow

• Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), New Delhi

National Health Mission

RMNCH+A - Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health. The objective of NHM is to improve maternal and child health and reducing maternal and child morbidity and mortality. It is aimed at reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health under a broad umbrella, and focusing on the strategic life cycle approach. In addition, the plus category focuses on:

• Inclusion of adolescence as a distinct life stage

• Linking maternal and child health to reproductive health components to family planning, adolescent health, HIV, gender, and preconception/prenatal diagnostic technique

• Linking home and community-based services to facility-based services

• Ensuring linkages, referrals, and counter-referrals between and among various levels of health care system

• Health Strengthening System

• Prioritization of high-impact interventions for various lifecycle stages

• Broad-based collaboration and partnerships with ministries, departments, development partners and civil society Current Status of key RMNCH+A/RCH Indicators

Source - SRS* 2017, a Strategic Approach to Reproductive, Maternal, Newborn, Child and Adolescent Health in India.

Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana (PMSSY)

Announced in 2003, PMSSY aims at correcting regional imbalances in the availability of affordable/reliable tertiary healthcare services. It has the following components:

• Setting up of AIIMS like Institutions - 22 new AIIMS have been announced so far.

• Focus on PG Education and Research

• Upgradation of Government Medical Colleges and Institutions

Department of Health Research (DHR)

The Department of Health Research is a separate Department within the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare. The objective of DHR is to bring modern health technologies to the people through research and innovations related to diagnosis, treatment methods and vaccines for prevention; to translate them into products and processes and, in synergy with concerned organizations, introduce these innovations into public health system.

Functions of Department of Health

Here’s listing out the major functions of the Department of Health:

• Promotion and co-ordination of basic, applied, clinical research, clinical trials, operational research in areas related to medical, health, biomedical and medical profession

• Development of infrastructure, manpower and skills

• Provide guidance on research governance and ethical issues in medical and health research

• Promote coordination of public - private - partnership in medical, biomedical and health research

• Facilitate advanced training in research areas concerning medicine and health

• Provide technical support for dealing with epidemics and natural calamities

• Conduct investigation of outbreaks due to new and exotic agents and development of tools for prevention

• Administering and monitoring of Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)

• Facilitate coordination between organizations and institutes under the Central and State Governments in areas related to the subjects entrusted to the Department and for the promotion of special studies in medicine and health

• Establishment of Model Rural Health Research Units (MRHRU) in the States

• Establishment of Multidisciplinary Research Units (MRU) in Government Medical colleges - Research Institutions

Grant-in-aid Scheme for Inter - Sectoral Convergence & Coordination for Promotion and Guidance on Health Research

Under this Scheme, the Department of Health Research (Ministry of Health & Family Welfare) provides assistance in the form of grant-in-aid to for carrying out research studies. This is done to identify the existing knowledge gap and to translate the existing health leads into deliverable products.

The objectives of this scheme are:

• Support studies on technology access, particularly in the context of Gender & Child health care

• Translation of leads into products/processes for adoption in public health systems

• Facilitate development of collaborative health research projects involving Science & Technology

• Evaluate the existing processes/ products/ technologies

• Deliver research for estimation of disease burden/ development of new technologies/process

• Address health research issues for affordable healthcare in the country

Conclusion

The Indian Government has made significant progress in the field of health. Many schemes are available even in the remotest regions of India.

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