Andhra Pradesh - Ongole   

Delay in treatment adds to mason's woes

Special Correspondent

FOR BETTER TREATMENT: The crippled mason being shifted to Guntur hospital.

ONGOLE: The life of a construction worker hangs in balance due to prolonged neglect of treatment for spinal injury he had suffered while at work.

Nelapati China Anjaiah, 20, eked out his livelihood working as mason in the unorganised sector. While making arrangements for plastering walls on the fourth floor of a building, he fell down and broke his spinal cord eight months ago. He was taken to a private hospital where the doctor demanded Rs. 50,000 for operation. Unable to meet the demand, he was taken home. The builder paid him a compensation of Rs.3,000.

After some days, he was taken to another doctor who felt that operation too would not help him much. He has been bed-ridden for the last eight months when the spinal cord was compressed leading to paraplegia, a condition in which he became immovable and bedsores have only complicated his case.

Bleak prospects

The neighbours took pity on him and brought him to grievances day meeting held here on Monday.

District Medical and Health Officer Sonar Babu, who examined him, felt that the prospects of his recovery were bleak. Had he been taken to Guntur general hospital soon after the accident, he would have got right treatment in neuro surgery department and recovered completely.

On his advice, he was admitted to the government hospital here.

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