Nalanda Medical College and hospital junior doctors call off strike after police deployment on campus

PATNA: The junior doctors of NMCH called off their strike on Friday evening following deployment of police force on the hospital premises.
NMCH junior doctors’ association (JDA) president Dr Ramchandra Kumar said they resumed work around 10pm, following assurance from Patna SSP Upendra Sharma about deployment of 20 constables each in two shifts at the hospital and one such team was deployed in the evening itself.
Earlier in the evening, Patna DM Chandrashekhar Singh and SSP Sharma visited NMCH and held talks with the JDA members. Dr Divyanshu Martand from medicine department at NMCH claimed that the DM and SSP were informed about acute shortage of manpower and some medical equipment at the hospital as the number of Covid patients were four times higher than last year.
Meanwhile, over 50 ambulances and private vehicles carrying serious Covid patients had to return in distress from the NMCH from Thursday night to Friday evening as about 200 junior doctors of the dedicated Covid hospital were on strike. New admissions of Covid patients had also come to a halt leaving patients and their kin to look for beds in other healthcare facilities.
The medicos were demanding security after the attendants of a patient created a ruckus and manhandled a doctor on duty on Thursday alleging delay in issuing the corona death certificate. The situation turned worse when some of the relatives of the patient damaged several ICU beds and instruments needed for treatment of serious patients, manhandled junior doctors and hurled abuses on lady doctors.
Narrating the woes due to doctors strike, a resident of Gola Road said he reached the NMCH with a patient on oxygen support by car around 10.30am but the hospital staff refused to admit him due to the strike. Finally, he could find an oxygen bed in a private hospital.
Another attendant of a serious patient was seen there begging to the hospital staff for oxygen to her patient gasping due to severity of the infection. “Inki saanse kam ho rahi hai.. kucch to kariye..”. But there was none to take notice of her pains.
NMCH superintendent Dr Binod Kumar Singh admitted that the hospital functioning had been badly hit due to the junior doctors’ strike. He also admitted that new admissions of Covid patients could not be made, except a few this morning and about 50 ambulances carrying Covid patients had to return. “We have demanded 60 policemen for duty in three shifts so as to ensure smooth functioning of the hospital,” said Singh.
The superintendent further complained of inadequate supply of oxygen, putting the healthcare under pressure. Most of the Covid patients were on oxygen support and the hospital required an additional reserve of 200 cylinders every day. “We panicked Thursday evening after the staff informed that oxygen supply to patients would stop in about 30 minutes, putting the lives of about 200 patients at risk. Our staff ran to different places and arranged a few cylinders which helped save many lives,” he said.
Another problem coming in the way of treatment at NMCH is shortage of medical staff. “The hospital administration wrote a letter on April 15 to the government asking for 100 doctors and 100 nurses for the treatment of 500 Covid patients, but nothing has happened till date,” said Dr Singh.