Capacity-building Initiatives in Non-Communicable Diseases in India

Non-communicable diseases (NCD) are reaching epidemic proportions in India and the escalating burden is expected to deepen economic load by putting further pressure into an already constrained health system. One of the serious constraints of the health systems is poorly skilled staff widening the gap between the demand and supply of healthcare professionals trained in NCDs. The current article reviews efforts made towards capacity building initiatives undertaken in India to address the limited human resources to counter the emerging burden posed by NCDs. This paper reviews existing literature on capacity building efforts on NCDs in India through gathering information from search engines such as Google Scholar and PubMed and other relevant websites. Even though health care professionals across all levels of health care have a critical role in prevention and control of NCDs, this review suggests minimal consolidated efforts at capacity building in the area of NCD within the health systems in India, albeit isolated efforts identified from different sectors. This review makes a case to upgrade and advance sustained efforts to enhance and improve capacity of workforce and to incorporate a component of NCD training into medical curricula.