Rajasthan agrees to implement Ayushman Bharat PM-JAY

The Rajasthan government gave has finally given an official go-ahead to implement Ayushman Bharat – Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PM JAY) in the State ending the months-long wait over the status of implementation of the flagship health protection scheme of the Central government.

Ayushman Bharat- Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY) will be integrated with Rajasthan's existing state health scheme, Bhamashah Swasthya Bima Yojana (BSBY). Speaking about the development Dr Indu Bhushan, CEO AB- PMJAY and National Health Authority said, "The National Health Authority has been constantly working closely with the Rajasthan Government in finding approaches to seamlessly integrate BSBY with AB-PMJAY. Yesterday, Shri Rohit Singh, Additional Chief Secretary, Health, Rajasthan informed us about the approval for implementation of AB-PMJAY in the State." Adding that, "We are very happy with the outcome and have assured all possible support including technical and policy-related assistance, to Rajasthan."

Currently, Rajasthan is providing benefits to 97 Lakh families under the BSBY scheme, and many of the eligible families under AB-PMJAY are already covered under BSBY. All eligible families under BSBY and AB-PMJAY will be made eligible to avail health benefits up to Rs. 5 Lakh per year under the scheme.

As far as the technology-related aspects are concerned in rolling-out the scheme, Rajasthan will continue the current software implementation, and systemic API based integration with solution suite of NHA for benefits to be delivered through AB-PMJAY is envisaged to be done.

As a part of Package Mapping, Rajasthan will run a package mapping exercise to ensure all packages specified under PM-JAY are mapped with the packages in BSBY. However, similar to any state running AB-PMJAY, Rajasthan has complete flexibility to expand beyond the AB-PMJAY packages. NHA team will provide full support for this activity to the State team, wherever required. For all the hospitals already registered in Rajasthan with BSBY, NHA shall facilitate that no duplicate process of re-registration is required.

Ayushman Bharat – Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY) is the flagship scheme of Government of India that provides a cover of up to Rs. 5 lakhs per family per year, for secondary and tertiary care hospitalization to over 10.74 crore vulnerable entitled families (approximately 50 crore beneficiaries). PM-JAY provides cashless and paperless access to services for the beneficiary at the point of service. Under this scheme, there are 1,393 health benefits packages with defined rates. Over 15,000 hospitals and health care providers have been empanelled across the country to provide healthcare services as per these packages.

The National Health Authority (NHA) is responsible for providing the overall stewardship for design, roll- out, implementation and management of Ayushman Bharat - Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB - PMJAY) at the national level. The officials involved in the implementation of PMJAY informed that so far around 3.8 crore E-cards have been issued, Rs 4,000 crore has been authorised for admission of patients and 15,642 hospitals are empanelled.