National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) was launched in 2005 with an aim to provide equitable, affordable and quality healthcare services to the rural population especially the vulnerable group. With the launch of National Urban Health Mission (NUHM) in 2013 to ensure same level of quality health care services among the urban population, it was subsumed under National Health Mission (NHM). Considerable progress in terms of health coverage has been made in the health sector with the launch of NHM. However, quality of services delivered remains an issue.

Also our public health facilities have been earlier accredited by external organizations which are hard to achieve and sustain. During late 2013, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare introduced the National Quality Assurance Standards (NQAS) for ensuring delivery of quality health services in public health facilities and to have inbuilt quality management system without being dependent on external agencies. NQAS Standards are available for District Hospitals (DHs), Community Health Centres (CHCs) (functional as FRUs), Primary Health Centres (PHCs) with bed and Urban PHC (UPHCs) without bed. These standards have been recognized by the Insurance Regulatory Development Authority (IRDA) for empanelment of hospitals. The standards also have international accreditation form International Society for Quality in Healthcare (ISQua). NQAS certification of health facilities have also been made eligible for Gold certificate under the Ayushman Bharat (AB-PM-JAY).

Quality & Patient Safety Division also advocate for implementation of LaQshya initiative which is high priority targeted programme launched in 2017. LaQshya aimed to reduce preventable maternal and newborn mortality, morbidity and stillbirths associated with the care around delivery in labour room and maternal OT and ensure respectful maternal care. The initiative targets to certify labour room and maternal OT as per NQAS standards and it also incentivize and brand the facilities achieving the NQAS certification.

Kayakalp Award initiative is another initiative launched under National Quality Assurance Programme in May 2015 which is an initiative to give awards to those public health facilities that demonstrate high levels of cleanliness, hygiene and infection control and support to achieve the greater goals of Swachh Bharat Mission. Cleanliness and hygiene in hospitals are critical to preventing infections and also provide patients and visitors with positive and feel good experience. Separate Kayakalp checklists are in place for DHs, CHCs, PHCs, UPHCs & Health and Wellness Centre. The seven thematic areas under Kayakalp initiative include Sanitation and Hygiene, Waste Management, Infection Control, Support Services, Hygiene Promotion and Beyond Hospital Boundary.

Quality & Patient Safety Division of RRC-NE has been supporting the 8 NE States for rolling out the National Quality Assurance Standards including LaQshya. The State and district officials are facilitated for providing quality services at the public health services through conduct of capacity building workshops at regional and state level, assessment of the shortlisted facilities, assisting the health facilities with gap closure action and facilitating the certification process at identified health facilities in states. The team also handhold the NE states in conducting three levels of Kayakalp assessment and timely declaration of the Kayakalp awards.

Division also support the States to enhance the satisfaction of patients visiting the public health facilities by providing support in implementing Mera Aspataal which is a simple, intuitive and multilingual user friendly application that captures patient feedback in a very short time on the quality of services received in public hospitals.