Karnataka   

Hina Fathima’s death highlights need to strengthen State’s public healthcare system

— Photo: V. Sreenivasa Murthy

Crowded place: Doctors attending to patients in the operation theatre of Victoria Hospital’s burns ward in Bangalore on Tuesday.

Bangalore/Mysore: The death of Hina Fathima in the burns ward of Victoria Hospital underlines yet again the Government’s failure to equip and strengthen the public healthcare system in the State. This is an irony at a time when private healthcare is booming and Karnataka is being touted as a health tourism destination.

A walk through the burns ward of Victoria Hospital, where Ms. Fathima struggled for life on a bed in the corridor, is testimony to the desperate need for upgrading the only government hospital in the State that has skilled doctors to conduct specialised plastic surgery on an acid attack victim.

There are only 40 beds in the burns ward, and there are about 65 patients admitted on an average. Shortage of doctors and nurses too is a problem. This, invariably, means a compromise on the level of care and hygiene. “We cannot turn anyone away like a private hospital,” said M. Shankarappa, Head of the Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery.

There has been improvement over the past 10 years, but a great deal more needs to be done “We need an additional operation theatre with good facilities,” said Dr. Shankarappa.

Another doctor, on condition of anonymity, said even the most basic surgical instruments were sometimes hard to get. They had asked for a tube to administer anaesthesia a year ago, but it was yet to come.

Poor patients from all over the State in need of skilled treatment, which could cost them lakhs of rupees in private hospitals, come to Victoria Hospital. Sarojini, an acid attack victim who died here a few months ago, had come all the way from Bijapur. Patients from border areas in neighbouring States, such as Hindupur, Anantapur and Hosur, also come here, which adds to the pressure on the hospital.

While this is the state of facilities at the premiere institution in the State’s capital, the conditions in district hospitals can only be imagined. Ms. Fatima, with 35 per cent “full thickness burns”, had to be shifted from Mysore to Bangalore because K.R. Hospital in Mysore did not have the facilities and skilled doctors to handle the complicated case. The doctors advised the family that plastic surgery had to be conducted on Ms. Fathima to prevent infection. Though some private hospitals in Mysore have plastic surgery units, they are beyond the reach of a poor family like that of Ms. Fatima.

On the lack of plastic surgery facility in K.R. Hospital, authorities says that the surgeon in charge of the plastic surgery department retired two years ago and the newly-appointed one was attending a training course and was only expected to join duty after a year.

Some surgeons at K.R. Hospital, who spoke to The Hindu on condition of anonymity, asked what was the point of having a plastic surgery department without skilled doctors. Conducting plastic surgery early, before the wounds healed, w ould help in saving the victims lives as there would be fewer complications. It was on August 8 that Ms. Fatima was attacked with acid by her husband.

Sanjana of the Campaign and Struggle Against Acid Attacks on Women (CSAAW) pointed out that one of the questions raised in the public interest litigation filed by them in the High Court was why district hospitals lacked facilities. This was also discussed in a subsequent meeting convened by Minister for Women and Child Welfare H.K. Kumaraswamy. But not much has progressed beyond assurances.

Dr. Shankarappa also underlined the need to change the recruitment policy for the public healthcare system. “People who study in government colleges move into highly paid private practice immediately. The best doctors are never available to the common man. We need legislation that makes it mandatory for students to serve in the public sector for five years.”

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