BANGALORE: Autonomous institutes such as the Jayadeva Institute of Cardiology and the Nephro-Urology Institute, which is in the pipeline, may be the great opportunity that specialists and teachers of medicine are looking for. But patients in Victoria Hospital and Bowring Hospital, and students of Bangalore Medical College (BMC), which is attached to these hospitals, are losing out on several counts.

It turns out that after the Jayadeva institute moved out of the Victoria Hospital campus to Bannerghatta Road four years ago, the Department of Cardiology has gradually been whittled down and, less than a year ago, the last doctor working in the department at Victoria Hospital left, effectively closing the department.

Inconvenience

Patients are being directed to the Jayadeva institute, at great inconvenience, and poor patients are made to shell out fees for various tests and treatment that they can ill afford.

A surgeon at Bowring or Victoria, for instance, while preparing to perform a major surgery on a patient, needs to refer the patient to Jayadeva for tests to certify him fit for surgery by a cardiologist.

Cost of tests

If cardiology services were available at the hospital, the cost of tests would have been nominal.

Sources told The Hindu that a lone cardiologist laboured on without assistants, attendants and equipment until a few months ago, waiting for promises to provide assistants to materialise. He has since taken voluntary retirement and joined a private super-speciality hospital.

Meanwhile, the Nephro-Urology Institute, which is to be housed on the old premises of the Jayadeva institute, is yet to begin functioning.

The Nephrology Unit continues to treat patients, says Medical Superintendent K.V. Ashok Kumar. Cardiology patients are being directed to Jayadeva after being given emergency treatment.

Learning opportunity

Dr. Ashok Kumar said students from the BMC would not suffer or lose out on a learning opportunity, as undergraduates are not required to study specialised disciplines.

But the fact is that the entire teaching staff of nephro-urology in the BMC have virtually moved to the institute in Victoria Hospital, and the department may have to be closed down. The college may have to forfeit the MD seats in the subject.

Postgraduate students visit Victoria and Bowring for practical experience.

Move justified

BMC sources have justified the faculty members' move saying the students will be sent to the autonomous institutes for a few weeks' training and their education will not be affected.

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