Amritsar: GMC Hospital in dire need of prescription for recovery
Manmeet Singh Gill
Tribune News Service
Amritsar, August 3
When Member of Parliament Gurjit Singh Aujla brought the pathetic state of affairs at Guru Nanak Dev Hospital here to the notice of the House on Friday, he was not talking about just any of the thousands of government hospitals in the country but the hospital associated with north India’s oldest medical education and research institute, Government Medical College (GMC) here.
Having served as a nursery of medical professionals who helped in setting up the PGI, Chandigarh, in its early days, the Government Medical College here has been on a downslide for the past many decades. The slip is so obvious that some employees have also started circulating the joke that its name should be changed from Guru Nanak Dev Hospital to ‘Kauda Raakshas Hospital’.
At the peak of its glory, the GMC always had a room reserved for the likes of chief minister Partap Singh Kairon. In contrast, a visit to the hospital now would reveal that even the poorest of the poor visit it only as a last resort.
While Aujla blamed shortage of manpower and infrastructure for the present state of affairs at the hospital, insiders admit that lack of work ethics and apathy are the reasons for the hospital’s fall from grace. “Many of the medical professionals, not only doctors but also paramedics and others, have financial interests in private medical institutions,” said a faculty member, adding that this needs to stop to improve medical services.
Touts and agents of private labs and hospitals roaming inside the wards of the hospital is not a secret. In connivance with the employees, these touts lure patients into getting services from them.
Interestingly, if the number of new building blocks constructed at the hospital in the last decade alone is any yardstick, the college is certainly upgrading its infrastructure, but the truth is otherwise. It does not have medical professionals to convert these buildings into a medical treatment centre. The GMC has also installed many costly machines during the recent years.
A senior faculty member said, “With such a large set-up of costly machines, the college needs a biomechanical wing which can solve minor faults instantly. Presently, even if a fuse needs changing, it requires a lot of efforts for which technicians come from Delhi or other far-off places.”
