Zero admissions at ESI hospital

It seems wilful and not an act of negligence that the Employees State Insurance (ESI) hospital on the Majitha road does not have a single medicine specialist for the past two years, in the absence of which the admissions of patients have almost dropped to zero here.

A visit to the state-of-the-art building of the hospital revealed that it had only one patient admitted in all of its six wards. Most patients coming to the hospital have to be referred to empanelled private hospitals.

Despite having nearly two lakh ESI card holders and their families dependent on it, the hospital's wards remain vacant and patients are being referred to other hospitals.

The situation is ironic, considering the hospital has four ENT specialists and two anaesthesia specialists, but only one surgery specialist. Anyone remotely associated with a hospital administration would know that number of anaesthesia specialists is usually less than the number of surgeons.

Moreover, out of the eight sanctioned posts of senior medical officers and seven posts of medical officers, only one medical officer post remains vacant.

A hospital employee highlighted the severity of the issue, stating that even the Health Minister, Dr Balbir Singh, was apprised of the situation during his visit. The employee emphasised that a medicine specialist is essential for providing medical services to patients.

The employees lamented that perhaps the government is not keen on improving health services at the ESI hospital. "The hospital started with 96 Class IV workers in 1961. Presently, we have only 26 of them. Over the years, the population has increased but the number of employees has gone down," said another employee.

While other government hospitals too face shortage of staff, the ESI hospital's struggles are unique, as it does have almost all the sanctioned posts of doctors filled but it does not have what it really needs.

Deputy Director-cum-Medical Superintendent Dr Anupinder Mathon said, "We have repeatedly set requests to the senior authorities regarding the situation." She said that they hope that the required arrangements for doctors would be made at the earliest.