According to sources at Nair Hospital, the Computerised Axial Tomography (CAT) machine has been out of order for almost one month and this has severely affected poor patients. The CT scan is the most basic investigation needed before any procedure can be carried out on a patient with a head injury, stroke or any disease that requires an operation, sources said.

The machine at Sion Hospital has been out of order for more than a week. The reason for this situation: once the X-ray tube in the machine goes out of order, there's no spare tube, and patients have to wait till a new one is imported from Germany. Sources said this has been happening regularly for many years, but the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has made no efforts to make the spare X-ray tube quickly available.

Asenior radiologist at KEM Hospital explained that while the X-ray tube at the hospital lasts for about four months, those at Sion and Nair Hospitals last for six and eight months respectively. And even though the cost of the tube has remained the same for the last four years, it takes anywhere between three to four months to get a new-X ray tube.

A month ago, the CT scan machine at KEM Hospital was also out of order and it look quite some time to get a new one, he added. Since the CT scan machines at these three municipal hospitals are of the same make, they sometimes exchange other spare parts, sources said. But despite this internal arrangement, the administration does little to get new spare parts on time.

At present, patients of Nair and Sion hospitals who require at CT scan are being diverted to KEM Hospital, but they are unable to get it done on time due to the heavy workload, sources said. Therefore, many patients are forced to get the CT scan done at private centres, which costs around Rs 2,500,while it costs Rs 1,000 at a municipal hospital, sources said. So delay in getting a new X-ray tube only means loss of revenue to the municipal corporation. However, the technical staff continues to get salaries for doing no work, sources said.

While KEM Hospital does 40 CT scans every day, Nair and Sion hospitals do about 25 and 30, sources said.

Additional municipal commissioner (health), Ratnakar Gaikwad, said they had tried to keep a spare X-ray tube available in the past, but this had not worked because there was a chance of the tube getting spoiled. He agreed poor patients are being put through needless problems and said he will speak to deans of the two hospitals and see that new X-ray tubes are brought as soon as possible.