Little Salim will not be able to celebrate Id at home with his family as his doctor left without giving him a discharge certificate. On Sundays and holidays, patients at the state-run Niloufer Hospital for Mother and Children are left to their own devices as no senior doctors are available to tend to them.
Salim’s father, Alam Basha from Tolichowki, sat despondently by his son’s bedside. His son had undergone a surgery on his palm following an accident. “The doctor told me that he will be discharged on Sunday morning. I was told to feed the boy and wait for an hour. If he doesn’t throw up, the doctor said, he is fit to be discharged. Accordingly, I waited for an hour and when I went to get his discharge slip, I was informed that the doctor had left for the day and we don’t even know if he will be available tomorrow. In fact, there are no senior doctors. No one else agreed to give us the discharge slip. So my son will have to spend Id in hospital now,” said Mr Alam.
Mr Alam is not the only one to suffer due to the hospital’s policy of allowing all senior doctors to stay away on Sundays or holidays. Narasimhlu from Sangareddy, whose 10-year-old son has been admitted for treatment of dengue, said, “Doctors are available in the emergency, but no senior doctors come for rou-nds on Sundays. Sometimes cases do turn complicated but there is nobody to treat the patients.”
It is a common sight on holidays to see patients wandering around wards in search of empty beds or endlessly wait for x-ray or lab test reports as there is nobody to attend to them. The corridors and wards (pre and post surgical wards) are filthy. On Sun-days, the hospital is littered with dirty water and garbage. The corridors and wards stink while the admi-nistrative block in sharp contrast always remains spic and span. The patients are at a high risk of hospital-acquired infections rat-her than be cured.