chandigarh the district hospitals in punjab haryana and himachal pradesh have been found wanting in the firstever performance assessment report compiled by niti aayog on different parameters according to an analysis based on health management information system hmis data the district hospitals in punjab and haryana failed to maintain the recommended minimum number of beds per one lakh populationagainst the recommended limit of 24 beds per one lakh population hospitals in districts of haryana had only 13 beds per one lakh population while in punjab the number of beds stood at 18 per lakh the hill state of himachal pradesh was found doing better than its two neighbouring states with 46 bedsin himachal only one hospital out of 11 909 fulfilled the indian public health standards iphs norms for positioned required number of doctors while no hospital in the state met the laid down norms pertaining to staff nursesin punjab 10 district hospitals out of 22 4545 had the required number of doctors and only two 909 had the requisite strength of staff nurses in terms of the ratio of medical staff haryana outperformed both the states with 16 out of 18 8889 hospitals meeting the mandated number of doctors and seven fulfilling norms related to positioning of staff nursesfor timely recruitment of doctors nurses and paramedical staff the central government has recommended a periodic review of the vacancies in all district hospitalsin haryana seven district hospitals fulfilled the criteria of having all the 14 mandatory support services including opd ipd pharmacy sterilisation and disinfection fullyequipped blood bank waste management medicolegalpostmortem service hospital transport ambulance dietary services for patient electric supply drugs and pharmacy water supply and refrigerationtwo civil hospitals of haryana hisar and panchkula featured in the list of topperforming district hospitals in the country having all the identified 14 servicesnone of the hospitals in punjab and himachal managed to make the cut hospitals in punjab and himachal on average provide 10 and 11 services respectively against the national average of 11 for improving the services experts have asked for periodic review and reporting on the quality of services for identify the gaps and take necessary actionshospitals of the region do not have all the identified diagnostic testing services that hold the key to early detection and proper treatment not even a single district hospital had all the 14 diagnostics services which include urine analysis stool analysis pap smear sputum haematology microbiology serology biochemistry cardiac investigations ophthalmology ent radiology endoscopy and physiologyon average hospitals in himachal and haryana offer 10 such services while 11 diagnostic services are available in the governmentrun hospitals in punjab