Software helps the paperwork. Working practices earn accreditation.
Ask us how structured records, audit logs and document numbering work in CuraVerto, and what they do and do not cover.
Ask us on WhatsAppAn OPD clinic with no beds is not the audience for NABH's entry-level certification or its small healthcare organisation programmes. Both are for hospitals with beds, and NABH's own pages list polyclinics and standalone dental or diagnostic centres under exclusions. The programme built for an OPD clinic or polyclinic is NABH's Allopathic Clinics accreditation (2nd edition, June 2023); dental clinics have a separate entry-level checklist. This guide was checked against NABH's own pages on 11 October 2026.
A general OPD clinic, polyclinic or dispensary belongs with Allopathic Clinics accreditation.
| Programme | Who it is for | Who it excludes | Edition |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small Healthcare Organisation (SHCO) Accreditation | Hospitals, day care centres and super or specialty centres with 50 or fewer sanctioned beds | Polyclinics, diagnostic centres, standalone eye or dental hospitals or centres | 3rd edition, August 2022 |
| Entry-Level Certification Programme (SHCO and hospitals) | Allopathic hospitals only: small healthcare organisations of up to 50 beds and hospitals of 51 beds and above | Standalone dental, physiotherapy, diagnostics and pathology, psychology, diabetology and de-addiction centres; non-allopathic hospitals | 2nd edition |
| Allopathic Clinics Accreditation | Allopathic clinics, polyclinics and dispensaries that are in operation and have implemented the NABH standards for at least three months | Non-allopathic systems; standalone single-specialty centres such as ophthalmology, imaging centres and dental clinics | 2nd edition, June 2023 |
| Entry Level Certification for Dental Clinics | Dental clinics with 1 to 8 chairs; checklist based | Dental clinics with more than 8 chairs, which are outside its stated scope | 1st edition, April 2023 |
NABH's clinics brochure defines a clinic as a single-doctor facility other than a hospital OPD, and a polyclinic as a clinic providing services in 2 or more specialties and sharing the same facilities. A standalone dental clinic is excluded from that programme and has its own entry-level checklist. Note that the clinics programme is accreditation, not an entry-level certificate.
No. Applying to NABH is voluntary, and NABH is not a condition of registration.
We could not source that. We found no NABH or insurer source that requires certification of a polyclinic or OPD clinic.
The 2nd edition has ten chapters plus three specialty chapters: dermatology services, dialysis care and diabetes care.
Of the 174, 52 are Core, 107 are Commitment, 13 are Achievement and 2 are Excellence. The ten chapters are:
| NABH chapter | Code | What it concerns in an OPD clinic |
|---|---|---|
| Access, Assessment and Continuity of Care | AAC | How patients are registered, assessed and followed up |
| Care of Patients | COP | Consistent clinical care and documentation of each visit |
| Management of Medication | MOM | Prescribing, storage and handling of medicines |
| Patient Rights and Education | PRE | Information, consent and patient rights |
| Infection Prevention and Control | IPC | Hygiene, sterilisation and waste practice |
| Patient Safety and Quality Improvement | PSQ | Safety practice and the quality indicators the clinic tracks |
| Responsibilities of Management | ROM | Leadership, policies and legal compliance |
| Facility Management and Safety | FMS | Premises, equipment, fire and safety |
| Human Resource Management | HRM | Staff credentials, training and records |
| Information Management System | IMS | Completeness, retrieval and access control of records |
Nothing in the chapter list is clinically difficult. Everything must be written down, consistently, over a sustained period.
NABH requires the standards to be implemented for at least three months before you apply.
Software does not get a clinic accredited. What it removes is the documentation scramble.
If your clinic also handles digital patient data at scale, read our DPDP Act guide linked below, since data-protection duties run parallel to accreditation.
Not through the programmes named entry-level for hospitals. NABH's Entry-Level Certification Programme (2nd edition) covers allopathic hospitals, from small healthcare organisations of up to 50 beds to hospitals of 51 beds and above, and excludes standalone dental, physiotherapy, diagnostics and pathology, psychology, diabetology and de-addiction centres. NABH's Small Healthcare Organisation accreditation programme is for facilities with 50 or fewer sanctioned beds and lists polyclinics and diagnostic centres under exclusions. The programme NABH built for clinics is Allopathic Clinics accreditation (2nd edition, June 2023). Checked on nabh.co on 11 October 2026.
NABH has a separate Entry Level Certification for Dental Clinics (1st edition, April 2023). It applies to dental clinics with 1 to 8 chairs and is checklist based. Its fee is INR 11,000 for 1 to 4 chairs and INR 15,000 for 5 to 8 chairs, plus 18% GST, for 2 years. NABH's Allopathic Clinics programme excludes standalone dental clinics. Checked on 11 October 2026.
No. Applying to NABH is voluntary, and NABH is not a condition of registration under the Clinical Establishments (Registration and Regulation) Act, 2010: the Act's text does not mention NABH or accreditation. Registration standards under the Act are those the Central Government prescribes, which is a separate matter from NABH.
We found no NABH or insurer source that requires NABH certification of an OPD clinic or polyclinic. NABH's entry-level page for hospitals lists easier participation in insurance programmes among its benefits. An older NABH portal page says entry-level certification of hospitals was made mandatory for cashless insurance facility; that page is undated, concerns hospitals, and we could not confirm it is current. Ask the insurer or TPA for its written empanelment criteria before spending money on certification.
NABH sets one fixed minimum we could source: a clinic must have implemented the NABH standards for at least three months before applying. NABH does not publish a total preparation time that we found, so any month-by-month plan is a planning assumption. In practice, the long pole is collecting a genuine run of records and indicator data, which is why record-keeping should be fixed first.
No. Certification is earned by working practices: infection prevention, consistent care documentation, and quality review. What software removes is the documentation scramble. CuraVerto keeps structured patient records with an audit log of every change, immutable document numbers, role-scoped access, and exportable indicator data, so the evidence an assessor samples already exists as a by-product of daily work.
CuraVerto keeps structured patient records, audit-logs every change, numbers every document immutably, and scopes access by role, so NABH preparation starts from organised evidence instead of a paper chase. Flat annual pricing, no per-doctor fees.
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