Doctors at Santa Cruz hospital go on strike even as local politician hurls abuse at medicos and hospital staff!
Doctors and medical staff went on a ‘flash strike’ at VN Desai Hospital in Santa Cruz (Mumbai) on Friday, after a politician verbally abused a doctor for not admitting a fever patient. Medical services were severely affected with several patients being turned away the whole day.
Prem Gupta (15) was brought to the hospital by his father Lalchand with high fever. Lalchand said he brought his son thrice to the hospital since Wednesday and doctors injected him with medicines and sent them home each time. A blood test was recommended for Oct 13th despite the boy suffering from fever since Monday. The doctors apparently also told him to go to a private clinic if he wanted a quicker diagnosis.
Mahendra Wadiwala, chief medical superintendent of BMC’s peripheral hospitals says, “The patient was being admitted to the casualty and put under observation. He was attended to and administered medicines,” The boy’s vitals were stable and he was being monitored too.
Drama started when Parkar who came into the hospital premises on Thursday evening at 10.30 p.m. He was informed by a friend of the Guptas that the boy was not being admitted in to the hospital despite suffering from high fever. The family also said that ‘someone’ told them the boy could be suffering from dengue and therefore needed to be admitted. Parkar went on to say that poor patients were having a tough time finding beds in other hospitals and he went on to abuse the hospital personnel.
The issue was finally put to rest and services resumed on Friday evening when civic authorities lodged a police complaint against local corporate Mahesh Parkar who had hurled abuses and even levelled bribery charges against the casualty medical officer (CMO). Hospital authorities also said that Parkar has previously too routinely interfered in the hospital’s work
While there are glimmers of hope for doctor this is yet another case where hospitals and doctors have been exposed to anger and abuse by a patient, patient’s relatives or in this case a politician supporting a patient.
Do they know about the treatment plan? How to read a patient’s vitals? What kind of medication to administer? On what basis was Parkar abusing the doctors and hospital staff. More importantly- how was he even allowed to enter the hospital and not be asked to get out? Where is the security for the doctors working there?
If a citizen of this country were to attempt Parkar’s actions at a local MLA or MP’s residence, they would have been chased away within minutes. Doctors continue to work under this kind of stress and tension while providing the best service they can. Once again, a scenario where doctors are taken for granted and treated badly!
Origianl Story – Times of India