Bhubaneswar, Oct 7 (IANS): Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Friday said that the traditional knowledge of Ayurveda along with modern healthcare system has been helpful in making our healthcare system more effective.

Patnaik said this during an induction programme of 143 Ayurvedic medical officers here.

The Chief Minister said that Ayurveda is an age-old knowledge of life science that has been traditionally helping millions of people in India in maintaining good health and controlling disease.

Now this knowledge, along with the modern healthcare system, has been revived with structured studies to help society with more effectiveness, he stated.

Welcoming the new medical officers to the healthcare system of the state, he asked them to follow the 5T (teamwork, transparency, technology and time leading to transformation) initiative to boost the state's transformative journey in healthcare.

Speaking that 'Sustha Odisha, Sukhi Odisha' has been the guiding principle of his government in healthcare, Patnaik directed the newly recruited officials to work in the approach of 'every life matters'.

The state government is committed to provide universal access to quality healthcare services and bring down the out-of-pocket expenses of the people.

For this, the size of the budget of the health department has been increased over the years.

"Our healthcare budget estimate has been increased to over Rs 12,000 crore in the current financial year which is almost double what it was three years ago. It is more than six percent of the state plan," he pointed out.

The Chief Minister hoped that joining such a large number of Ayurvedic Medical Officers would improve the healthcare support system and result in greater satisfaction of the people.