CHANDIGARH: The Punjab Cabinet on Friday gave nod to empanel 300 doctors, specialised in 12 key domains, to improve healthcare services across the state. According to an official statement issued here following the meeting chaired by Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, the cabinet gave nod to empanel 300 doctors across 12 key specialties, including medicine, pediatrics, psychiatry, dermatology, chest and tuberculosis, surgery, gynaecology, orthopedics, ophthalmology, ENT, and anaesthesiology, in government health facilities. This step will significantly augment specialist availability and improve the quality of secondary healthcare delivery in Punjab, it added. The empanelment of specialists will be done at district level through civil surgeons and the empanelled specialist shall be entitled to an empanelment fee per patient for various services like OPD, IPD, emergency calls, major and minor surgeries, and others. After the cabinet meeting, Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema said the decision will also help tide over the shortage of specialists in government facilities. The empanelled doctors will get an incentive of Rs 100 per patient for examining them in both OPD (outpatient department) and IPD (in-patient department), he said. However, a cap has been set on the number of patients these specialists can examine — between 50 and 150 in the OPD, and two to twenty in the IPD, the minister added. Cheema said if a specialist government doctor, who is on night duty, is called at day time, they will get an incentive of Rs 1,000. If the doctor is not on duty during night hours, but is called during the period, then the incentive will double. The day time duty hours will be counted from 8 am to 8 pm, he added. Cheema said officials have also been asked to prepare a proposal for a new incentive-based policy for government doctors and teachers posted in the border areas.The cabinet, meanwhile, also gave approval to Punjab Minor Minerals Rules 2013 in accordance with the Punjab State Minor Minerals (Amendment) Policy, 2025.