IPGISSH & IGH Merger to Serve as a Healthcare Hub in Eastern India

Senior BJP leader Ramesh Agarwal, in a letter to the PM, mentioned that the INR 350 Cr Central funds used for the undeveloped IPGISSH can be used to address the need for specialised healthcare.

The demand for the development of a comprehensive medical institution with unification of the Rourkela-based new Ispat Post-Graduate Institute and Super Specialty Hospital (IPGISSH) and Ispat General Hospital (IGH) is surging.

Both institutions come under the Rourkela Steel Plant (RSP) of SAIL wherein the IPGISSH was proposed as an extension of the IGH to address the growing healthcare needs of the region.

The Backstory

The IGH has been around for more than six decades. It was originally set up in 1959 to provide healthcare to employees of the Rourkela Steel Plant and their families, as well as people from nearby areas.

Over time, the demand for advanced medical care grew, leading to the idea of expanding IGH.

In 2015, instead of PM’s plans to upgrade the IGH into a medical college, the RSP constructed the IPGISSH as an extension of IGH with central funds.

This new hospital was designed to offer specialized treatments and post-graduate medical education.

It was officially dedicated to the nation in March 2021. The goal was to upgrade healthcare services in the region and provide better medical facilities to the people.

Now, there’s a growing demand to merge both hospitals into a single, comprehensive medical institution to improve efficiency and healthcare delivery.

Additionally, in a letter to the PM, senior BJP leader Ramesh Agarwal mentioned, despite RSP spending approximately INR 80–90 Cr annually on its employee healthcare scheme, limitation in modern infrastructure of IGH and the Sector-22 hospital still persists.

As a result, many RSP employees and their families continue to rely on referred hospitals across Odisha and even in neighboring states for specialized and advanced medical treatment, particularly for conditions that require facilities or expertise not currently available within the RSP healthcare infrastructure.

The Ongoing Matter

The proposal has been welcomed by local residents, medical professionals, and policy observers who see the unification as a long-overdue step toward fulfilling the 2015 promise of establishing Rourkela as a healthcare hub in eastern India.

For this, Agarwal suggested that the unused infrastructure of the planned PG institute at IPGISSH, which shares a boundary with IGH, could be repurposed to enable the creation of an integrated healthcare and academic institution.

Moreover, this would require minimal physical restructuring and can immediately serve as a well-integrated hub for medical education in the region, Agarwal added.

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Stay tuned for more such updates on Digital Health News