Empty wards and apathy stalk Siddharth Municipal Hospital

Empty wards and apathy stalk Siddharth Municipal Hospital
Rajiv Sharma

JANUARY 4: Though this hospital was constructed in 1992, it began functioning only in 1997 and although it is located in a heavily populated area, the hospital has failed to attract patients because of a lack of infrastructure. Sources said that the patients are mostly seen by the adminstrative medical officers who are actually supposed to be supervising over the paramedical staff. But in the absence of a separate full time staff for surgery, medicine, orthopaedics, paedriatics, gynaecology and opthalmology, there is no other option, according to a senior AMO.

A visit to the hospital revealed that the medical, surgical and orthopaedic wards have been merged into one. There is one common ward for male patients and another one for female patients. And each time a patient has any problem, the AMO on duty is summoned by the nurses and this results in no specialised treatment being adminstered, sources said. Though there are a few honorary doctors appointed in recent months, they come to the hospital only on certain days and do not stay for more than a couple of hours.

This attitude of the doctors was highlighted in a case, when a female patient, Pramila Chechwani, was injured in an accident and was referred by her family doctor to this hospital for stitches on her wound. Instead of giving her stitches, the AMO merely gave her a dressing, and when she began screaming in agony, the other doctor who was treating her wound on the ear, threatened her. Chechwani claims the next day the wound became infected, and when she showed this to her family doctor, he immediately complained about this to the hospital authorities.

Surprisingly, the patient had to remove a couple of glass pieces from the wound herself after reaching home, even though the AMO claimed that he had cleaned it and found no foreign bodies, she said.

Bureaucratic bungles are also commonplace. An orthopaedic surgeon who had been temporarily appointed was discontinued from service but the hospital authorities had not been told about this. As a result, patients who had been coming for orthopaedic ailments were repeatedly told to come back some other day, the duty AMO, sources said.

When asked about this, the chief medical officer, Dr Kiran Chawla admitted that some wards had to be merged because there was no separate paramedical staff to manage them on a round the clock basis. However, from patient care point of view, honorary doctors have been appointed and they come to the hospital on fixed days, she said. When asked why the hospital did not have patients after more than three years, the CMO said that it takes time for any hospital to run in a full fledged manner.

Regarding Chechwani's complaint, Dr Chawla said that the stitches were not given probably because the patient came to the hospital after some delay, and hence a dressing was the right thing to do. Only, that the AMO neglected to inform the patient about this line of treatment, and therefore she got upset over this, she said. However, since the patient has complained, the particular doctor would be warned and care would be taken to attend to patients in a more sympathetic manner, she assured.

However Chechwani maintained that it was for the second time that the doctor had shown apathy towards them, and with this behaviour it is not surprising that patients are unwilling to come here.