In an effort standardise the vast medical healthcare industry of the country, rating agency ICRA has come out with a methodology for grading healthcare institutions. The product was presented to clinics at a formal function in the city on Saturday.

The grading system has been developed in association with Hospital Service Consultancy Corporation (India) Ltd, a public sector organisation. D N Ghosh, chairman of ICRA said ICRA had been cautious to take up new projects as it was keen to deliver quality.

“We have been doing financial rating. Later, we ventured out to rating of construction projects. Healthcare grading, too, we believe, would be an extension of our core competence,” Ghosh said in a seminar on “External Assessment of Healthcare Quality: Role of Grading” organized by the Bengal Chamber of Commerce & Industry (BCCI) and Assocham.

He pointed out the role rating agencies played in 1990’s to establish quality and credential of debt instruments and hoped same would be repeated with healthcare grading.

P K Choudhury, managing director of ICRA said more and more private capital would come in the healthcare sector given the government was not in a position to bridge the demand supply gap. “Options are being created before the user (patient). In such a situation there is need for grading healthcare,” he said.

ICRA is offering four grading starting from H1 to H4. The grading evaluates the capability to deliver quality of care from the user perspective. Grading is designed to evaluate the two important dimension of care viz. technical and interpersonal care. A healthcare institution with higher grading would have a relatively better care infrastructure and processes than graded lower.

The benefit of grading would not be restricted to users only. For healthcare institution, there is need to differentiate and establish a favourable price-value equation, for regulators, the provision and quality of healthcare can be monitored. Importantly, grading will help insurers identify institution they can associate themselves, lenders too, can find out the viability of an institution.

However, the most important criteria would be judging the quality of care.

Satadal Saha, managing director of West Bank Hospital, pointed out at the meeting that unregulated growth in the sector and rampant malpractice in terms of unnecessary hospitalisation and over diagnosis could be checked with help of grading.

Choudhury said Christian Medical College of Vellore was the first healthcare institution in India to grade itself. “We would be happy to grade 150 institution in next five years,” Choudhury said adding that grading would be a continuous process and any institution would have chance to improve upon itself if it was not happy with lower grading.