India faces an acute shortage of affordable healthcare professionals and facilities, especially in rural areas. LAHI aims to address this issue in two blocks of Una district of Himachal Pradesh: Gagret and Bangana. The first phase has already benefited more than 1,00,000 people, through general health camps and specialised health camps.
The programme also entails a Mobile Medical Unit (MMU) with a doctor, and has set up 5 Luminous Village Health Centres to widen its scope of service delivery. Apart from these, LAHI also conducts health and hygiene workshops, school camps, life skill workshops, distributes free over-the-counter medicines (OCM), etc.
26,191 Total no. of patients
26,654 Total screenings
15,733 Patients treated
14,576 Total patients who received OCM
702 Total number of patients referred
175 MMU visits
6 Health and hygiene workshops
4 Specialised camps
38 School camps
39 LVHC
72 Life skill workshops
The World Bank estimates that 90% of all health needs can be met at primary health care centres, yet this sector is the most under-invested in our country. As per National Health Profile, 2018, there is only 1 doctor for every 11,082 patients, ten times more than WHO recommended ratio of 1:1,000. There are grave regional disparities with Bihar being the worst affected with just one doctor serving a population of 28,391. The situation is dire: 1331 people died in 2017 due to diarrhoea, 1,57,996 reported cases of dengue, cases of deaths due to kala azar, malaria and jaundice are also on the rise.
Health is one of the essential components of human resource. The magnitude of the problem is too big for the state to solve on its own. Though there are private players providing quality healthcare, it’s quite often exorbitantly priced. Due to lack of affordable health facilities, diseases often go undetected till they have aggravated to an extent where it takes a toll on the financial security of the patient and her family, often perpetuating poverty. This is why Luminous has decided to intervene with our CSR programme: Luminous Advanced Healthcare Initiative (LAHI).
LAHI aims to promote accessible and affordable healthcare to our people. The programme entails: free health camps and regular clinic service at need based select locations, specialised medical camps, laboratory examinations, referrals and follow ups. Diseases that receive special attention are: diabetes, arthritis, anaemia, RTI/STD and depression.
Mobile Medical Unit (MMU) that travel through villages, equipped with a doctor and assistants who screen patients for diabetes, anaemia, hypertension
5 Luminous Village Health Centres (LVHCs) have been set up in villages across Gagret and Bangana to provide weekly health care services in dental, eye
Maternal and child care is particularly emphasised through LVHCs which holds special monthly workshops for gynaecology care.
Specialist camps for gynaecology, along with screening, diagnosis and treatment of diabetes and , arthritis to be held once in every quarter.
School camps conduct screenings for dental, eye refraction and HB testing in 30 schools every month.
Health and hygiene workshops conducted once every quarter emphasise on drug de-addiction, alcoholism and ENT related issues.