HOSPITAL WHERE PATIENTS ARE TREATED, IS SICK ITSELF DUE TO INDIFFERENT ATTITUDE OF THE OFFICIALS CONCERNED

Ara, 17 June 2023, (RNI): Ara Sadar Hospital that is renovated with crores of rupees and equipped with latest equipment has gained notoriety as ‘Referral Hospital’ in the recent years as over 80% patients are referred to the Patna Medical College and Hospital and other places. Reportedly, the doctors are reluctant to take up serious and even the normal patients and they think it easy to refer them to other places to shrug their responsibility. The act of doctors costs the patients dearly and some serious patients died en-route to PMCH whose lives can be saved if treated honestly at the Ara Sadar Hospital. The government doctors run their private clinics and they are interested in their clinics than discharging their duties at the Ara Sadar Hospital.

Bhojpur district has one Sadar Hospital, two Sub-Divisional Hospitals, four Referral Hospitals, four Community Health Centres and Primary Health Centres at every block besides Additional Primary Health Centres but all the health cenrtres are worth the names and referred the patients to avoid their responsibilities.

At least 600 poor patients from Ara and remote places in Bhojpur district visit the Ara Sadar Hospital daily for registration and treatment in the Out Door Patient (OPD) of which only 20% to 25% patients were admitted to the Ara Sadar Hospital.

Ara Sadar Hospital lacks medicine distribution counters causing a lot of problems to the hapless poor patients. After oath taken ceremony as the Deputy Chief Minister cum Health Minister cum Minister-in-charge, Bhojpur district, Tejaswai Yadav had directed to improve the facilities in the hospitals of Bihar but the Ara Sadar Hospital had queer ways where the three medicine distribution counters were in operation but after the direction it seized to two only. Besides, as per the direction of the government, information regarding the stock of medicines should be given though a letter every day morning but it is seldom done. The patients were provided with only two or three medicines only and they have to purchase the rest from the open market. The government has directed to keep stocks of 335 medicines for the OPD whereas stocks of 226 medicines for the Indoor patients but the Ara Sadar Hospital administration never do so and the patients are given only 50% of prescribed medicines.

The government has directed to provide different colour bedsheets to the indoor patients on different day to maintain sanitation but it is also not done. The patients are not being provided fixed colour bedsheet and most of the beds are without bedsheets. Besides, the government has fixed menu for the indoor patients so that they can get healthy and nutritious food and may be cured at the earliest but they are not supplied with breakfast and meal as directed by the government

Ara Sadar Hospital has 300 beds for the patients but only 160 beds are available for the patients as the main building of the Ara Sadar Hospital is under construction and details are as follows:-30 beds in medical wards, 30 beds surgical wards, 10 beds in burn ward, 20 beds in De-Addiction Wards, 15 beds in emergency wards, 05 beds in ICU wards, 40 beds in Delivery Wards and 10 beds in NRC ward.

But the Burn Ward on the campus of Ara Sadar Hospital does not have AC and curtains and even bedsheets are not provided while the AC is a must in the burn ward for the benefit of patients. In the burn wards, male and female patients kept and they have to face a lot of problems in absence of curtains but the hospital management is nothing to with it. Even the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) remains closed all the time. Four or five days after the inauguration, it was closed and machines worth crores of rupees are rusting due to indifferent attitude of the officials of the hospital.

The Ara Sadar Hospital one Civil Surgeon, one Superintendent, eight physicians including three on contract basis, six gynecologists, one psychiatrist, one dermatologist, one Paediatrician, three Anesthesiologists, two Orthopedists, one microbiologist, two pathologists, 20 general and lady doctors, one dentist, one public hospital manager, 15 staff nurses are available in full quota while general surgeons 03 of 30, ENT doctors are 3 of 6, Ophthalmologists are 1 of 2, posts of radiologist (1), Ayush physicians (4) are vacant, NSCU 3 of 4 and A grade nurses are 56 of 100 and one person is posted against 10 sanctioned posts in the Operation Theatre Assistant, Hospital Worker, OPD-Blood Bank.  But still some departments are running without doctors. Some of the doctors are on study leave or absent for years. Dr Sushama Kumari is in the PMCH, Dr. Sayyad Nazneen is absent from January 31, 2019, one psychiatrist is on study leave while Dr. Navneeta Kumari on deputation in the PMCH and Dr Priyanka Yadav is also on deputation in DMCH and Dr. Anita Singh is absent since her joining.

The Ara Sadar Hospital does not have Trauma Centre due to indifferent attitude of the government and serious patients face lot of problems. The Trauma Centre has all facilities for the serious patients and it is surprising that the hospital has not trauma centre when a number of serious patients daily come there.

During COVID-19, the local MP and Union Energy Minister R K Singh had made available 25 oxygen cylinders, 500 oxygen flow meters, 500 pulse oxy meters,10 oxygen concentrators, functional monitor, ECG machine, Nebulization machine, 5 suction machines, 5BI-PAP machines, 5 Syringe pumps, 4 cardiac monitors, 4 cardiac beds, 2 portable ECG machines, portable X-ray machine, Auto-analyzer machine, D-Dimmer/L-6 CRP Tropolin machine but most of them are not used as the doctors are reluctant and prefer to refer the patients to other places though the hospital has no scarcity of competent doctors and they are withdrawing lakhs of rupees per month as salary but they are useless for the poor patients and the government doctors either refer the patients to other places like PMCH, IGICS or AIIMS under well planned strategy or their agents or brokers take them to the private clinics of their respective doctors. In some cases some doctors verbally sent the patients to their private clinics saying they would get better treatment there. After the patients are referred from the Ara Sadar Hospital, 90% of referred patients prefer to go to private clinics where they are financially exploited and their attendants are misbehaved. Some agents and brokers also take them to Patna and instead of admitting them in the PMCH, they take the patients to private clinics there where they allegedly get a handsome commission. Besides, the general wards, child ward, lady ward and other wards run with the help of nurses and doctors hardly visit the wards.

To ensure presence of doctors at the Ara Sadar Hospital, the government made bio-metric attendance of the doctor mandatory and the doctors accepted it after much protest. But the doctors find out a novel way and after making biometric attendance, they disappeared from the hospital on one excuse or other and the hapless patients searched for them round the corner for treatment. Some A-grade nurses are getting their salaries without performing their duties. Some nurses are on CCL while some after returning from CCL do not attend their duties. Some doctors who are posted at the Ara Sadar Hospital for over 15 years are involved in politics and also run their private clinics where they do rousing business.

Civil Surgeon Dr. Suresh Prasad Singh said that he has written to the Health Department for the scarcity of doctors and the department will take action in it. Medicines are supplied by BMSCAL. He added that the ambulances will be repaired and number of stretchers will be increased very soon.