Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

Patients caught between sparring doctors

Thiruvananthapuram: Patient care activities in many government hospitals in the district, including major first referral units (FRUs), have been badly affected following a stand-off between government doctors and the doctors posted by the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM).

The Health Department, through NRHM, has posted around 110 doctors in the district on contract to serve in government health care institutions with in-patient facility. The doctors work in three shifts and those on contract are expected to take call duties also.

However, in many institutions, especially three FRUs, Chirayinkeezh, Neyyattinkara and Peroorkada, the stand-off between NRHM’s contract doctors and the government doctors have been creating problems for the patients as well as the administrators. The district has six FRUs.

When posting additional doctors on contract in these FRUs, the focus had been on providing more gynaecologists so that they can handle more deliveries as well as complicated cases like hysterectomies.

Things did seem to be going well initially but disparities in salaries and working hours between government doctors and NRHM doctors, prompted dissent.

The NRHM doctors are paid Rs. 25,000 for fixed hours of work while the government doctors are paid less and have to bear additional responsibilities. The NRHM, while pouring in funds, has in effect created two classes of doctors, it has been alleged. The administration’s handling of the strike by government doctors who were demanding a revised pay scale has also not helped.

The clash between doctors has reached a stage at Neyyattinkara taluk hospital, wherein the three additional gynaecologists posted by NRHM are refusing to undertake call duties. Government doctors have adopted the stand that the NRHM doctors, who are paid more salary, should attend call duties while the NRHM doctors claim that they need to work for only specified hours. As a result duty doctors are forced to handle emergency gynaecology cases, which inevitably ends up with the case being referred to either SAT or W&C Hospital.

“The ultimate responsibility, in case a patient dies in-transit, will fall on the government doctors. Patients have been suffering on account of the stand-off between the two sections of doctors,” a health official said.

The on-going clash between the doctors is a pointer that the government’s claims of strengthening hospitals in the periphery exist only on paper.

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