The state government on Tuesday launched the central referral system — one of the demands of the protesting junior doctors — that will ensure that a government hospital refers a patient to another state-run facility only if the latter has a vacant bed and the facilities to treat the patient.

A pilot project was launched on Tuesday with MR Bangur Hospital being the destination hospital for referrals.

Earlier this month, Bengal’s chief secretary Manoj Pant had said the state would roll out a pilot project on referral of patients and bed availability by October 15.

The system, he said, will be introduced across the state in the first week of November.

A lawyer representing the Bengal government told the Supreme Court during a hearing of the RG Kar case on Tuesday that a pilot project of the central referral system had been launched.

Sources in the state health department said the new system would make doctors more accountable as they have to cite the reason for referring a patient to another government hospital. It should reduce the harassment of patients who often have to visit one government hospital after another in search of a bed.

A health department official said the system should also reduce the burden on tertiary care hospitals because it is often alleged that primary, sub-divisional or district hospitals refer patients to speciality hospitals, such as medical colleges, without making any attempt to treat them.

The introduction of the central referral system is one of the 10 demands of the junior doctors. The junior medics have said that patients’ families or acquaintances often get angry and assault doctors because they are unable to ensure admission.

The junior doctors think the introduction of the central referral system and a system to display the number of vacant beds at government hospitals would solve the problem.

Six patients were referred to MR Bangur Hospital till Tuesday evening through the central referral system, said Sisir Naskar, the medical superintendent of the hospital. “They were referred from hospitals such as Sonarpur Rural Hospital, Vidyasagar State General Hospital and Baghajatin State General Hospital. One patient, who had fever, was referred from RG Kar Medical College and Hospital,” said Naskar.

A senior official at a medical college said a doctor referring a patient will have to mention the reason for the referral. The doctor also has to mention the investigations done and state his or her opinion about the patient after the initial treatment.

Health department officials have often said that they have come across instances of patients being referred to medical colleges from hospitals in districts though the district hospitals had the infrastructure to treat the ailments.

“The new system will make doctors at government hospitals more accountable. Earlier, many doctors referred patients without mentioning the reason and specifying which hospital the patient should go to,” the official said.

In the new system, a doctor has to log into the portal of the health management information system of the state health department while referring a patient.

The doctor will receive options from among the hospitals where the patient’s ailment can be treated and where a vacant bed is available. Once the doctor enters the patient’s details and refers the patient to a hospital, the destination hospital will provide a token number.

“If the hospital where the patient has been referred to does not respond to the message on the portal, the patient will automatically be allocated to that hospital after 30 minutes,” said an official.

“The referral system will facilitate patient flow in both directions. If a doctor at a higher facility feels the patient can be treated at a lower facility, the patient can be referred there,” he said.

“The patient will report to the hospital where she or he has been referred to with a token number. However, there is a possibility that by the time the patient turns up at the hospital, the bed has been allotted to someone else. In that case, the receiving hospital will treat the patient till he or she gets a bed at another hospital,” said the official.

A senior official in the state health department — director of hospital administration — will be the nodal officer for the implementation of the referral system across the state.