NABH: All you need to know.

NABH is an acronym for National Accreditation Board for Hospitals & Healthcare Providers. Established in 2006 as a constituent board of Quality Council of India it focuses on establishment and operation of accreditation program for hospital and healthcare providers.

Coming to the point, NABH has designed an exhaustive healthcare standard for hospital and health providers consisting of precise and strict 600 plus objective elements for the hospital to achieve in order to get the NABH accreditation. These standards are divided between patient centered standards and organization centered standards.

To comply with these standard elements, the hospital will need to have a process-driven approach in all aspects of hospital activities — from registration, admission, pre-surgery, peri-surgery and post-surgery protocols, discharge from the hospital to follow-up with the hospital after discharge. Not only the clinical aspects but the governance aspects are to process driven based on clear and transparent policies and protocols.In a nutshell NABH aims at streamlining the entire operations of a hospital.

NABH is equivalent to JCI and other International standards including HAS: Haute Authorite de Sante, Australian Council on Healthcare Standards, the Japan Council for Quality in Health Care, and the National Committee for Quality Assurance in the United States. Its standards have been accredited by ISQUA the apex body accrediting the accreditators hence making NABH accreditation at par with the worlds most leading hospital accreditations.

To be inculcated as a good official practice in INDIA, soon a majority of state governments will recognize NABH accreditation as a condition of licensure and the receipt of Medicaid reimbursement.

We will be posting more insights of NABH in our coming blogs throughout this month, and also highlight other analogous accreditation parameters in other market segments. Stay tuned at fungru.