Health department promises merit-based picks for medical superintendents but has not named the hospitals, the number of posts or the selection panel
LAHORE:Punjab’s Specialized Healthcare and Medical Education Department will interview candidates next week for medical superintendent posts at several government teaching hospitals, it said on Saturday, promising that the selections would be made entirely on merit.
The medical superintendent, or MS, runs a hospital’s day-to-day administration, from staff rosters and emergency cover to procurement and patient complaints. The department said the appointments were expected to improve administration, patient care and other operations in its teaching hospitals.
Upon requested by The Lahore Times they did not say which hospitals were involved, how many posts were vacant, who would sit on the interview panel, or whether the posts would be filled on tenure contracts or by regular officers. Those details matter because several large government hospitals have been run by acting heads for long periods.
The department decided in March 2025 to appoint permanent medical superintendents at 24 teaching hospitals and the chief minister approved a search committee to find them. In February this year, the heads of several major teaching hospitals, including some in Lahore, were reshuffled. The department’s own jobs page shows it has advertised MS posts more than once in recent years.
Frequent changes at the top make continuity in hospital management harder. Lahore General Hospital this week formed a vigilance team and suspended four officials for negligence, while staff at Mayo Hospital have complained of repeated delays in salary payments, the kind of administrative failures an MS is expected to fix.
The appointments come as Punjab expands specialist services in its teaching hospitals, including an extra Rs5bn for stroke care and plans for heart transplants. New hospital heads will be responsible for running those programmes.
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