No let up in manhandling of health staff at govt facilities

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, October 11

Hospital managements seem incompetent to deal with anti-social elements as is evident from the rising instances of manhandling and misbehaviour with employees at government health facilities. In a fresh incident at Bebe Nanki Mother and Child Care Centre at Government Medical College here, the hospital staff had to lock the doors of the operating theatre to save them from the wrath of attendants of a patient.

The incident occurred on Sunday night when relatives of a pregnant woman demanded the hospital staff to attend to their patient on a priority basis. However, as the hospital staff preferred to attend to patients as per their arrival list, it led to an argument.

Hospital’s medical superintendent, Dr Ram Sarup Sharma, said, “The attendants of patients sometimes fail to understand that every patient is an emergency case and doctors cannot pick and choose between them.” He said the instance had been brought to his notice and a police complainant had been filed.

However, this was not the first instance in which people created ruckus at the hospital alleging delay in medical services. Only two months ago, three junior resident doctors were thrashed by the attendants of a patient. Later, the staff had gone on a protest and demanded that their security be enhanced.

The hospital management stated that it was working on a proposal to enhance security at the hospital. A junior resident doctor said, “We have demanded from the hospital management to issue entry passes to attendants of patients so that only one or two can enter the premises.” He said sometimes when there were more number of attendants with a patient, they created problems. Hospital employees stated that security guards deployed by the hospital, too, were reluctant to come to the rescue of employees in such cases.