4K bills pending at Patiala Civil Surgeon’s office

Karam Prakash

Patiala, November 19

Government employees and pensioners in the district are in distress as their medical bills are waiting clearance at the Patiala Civil Surgeon’s (CS) office. As of now, over 4,000 medical bills are pending at the office. Reportedly, around 2,000 medical bills are received by the CS office every month. Notably, medical bills up to Rs 25,000 are cleared at CS office, before they are reimbursed by the respective departments Health officials said said the Health Department was facing shortage of the permanent staff that made the delay in clearing the medical bills. “Existing (sanctioned) posts are not sufficient to handle the workload. More permanent staff should be deployed to avoid any pendency, said an officer posted at CS officer.

Dr Varinder Garg, Civil Surgeon, said five medial officer (MOs) have been specially appointed to clear the pendency of the medical bills. He said two clerks had been assigned the task to clear the bill pendency. “Teams have been formed to clear the pendency at the earliest. I am hopeful that around 2,000 bills – of the total 4,000 pending bills – will be cleared by the end of the next week.”

Dr Garg added that special instructions had been given to prioritise the Medical so as to clear the bills of concerned patients.