The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Confusion over treatment of ailing children

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Oct 16, 2004

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Confusion over treatment of ailing children

By Dennis Marcus Mathew

HYDERABAD, OCT. 15. Confusion still persists over treatment of children with heart ailments who have been identified at screening camps held at district hospitals across the State.

The situation in the State capital itself is the best example and an indicator of how far the Government's efforts to provide treatment to poor children have percolated to officials.

Nearly two months after the screening camps held at Gandhi Hospital and Osmania General Hospital (OGH), during which 25 children out of 372 have been identified for surgeries within 20 days (by September 11), only 13 have been operated upon so far. None of the officials knows what happened to the remaining 12.

Even the Central Monitoring Cell (CMC), constituted a week ago to supervise the treatment and scrutinise bills submitted by hospitals, has no clue where the 12 children are, let alone knowing whether they are operated upon or not.

Break-up

According to the District Medical and Health Officer (DM&HO), B. Satyavathi, 188 children were identified as cardiac patients at the camp held at Gandhi Hospital on August 22. Of these, three were referred for immediate treatment and 14 for surgery within two weeks. Sixteen were to be operated upon within six months. At OGH, 184 were identified with heart ailments of which 11 were marked for surgeries within 20 days.

Apart from the 13 who were operated upon, the DM&HO says: "the rest are being operated upon as per their condition or being referred to different hospitals." There is no clarity as to why these children have been asked to undergo surgeries within 20 days at the camp if they were to be sent back to be "operated upon as per their condition."

Meet on October 18

The Director of Medical Education, K. Bhaskar Rao, who is the chairman of the CMC, says: "All over the State, 191 children have been operated upon so far from the 6,000 who have been identified. We are asking hospitals to do surgeries depending on the child's condition."

For its part, the CMC is yet to meet the 27 hospital officials across the State, including corporates, who have agreed to do the surgeries as per package rates 20 per cent less than the rates at NIMS. "There will be a meeting on October 18 with them to fix the rates," Mr. Rao says.

When asked about the first instalment of Rs. 8 crores the Government released a week ago and the Rs. 10 crores the Centre sanctioned, the DME says there are no instructions from the Government regarding how to utilise the amount.

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