Govt hospitals in Mumbai need staff, gadgets

It’s official now. Government hospitals are in desperate need of help in terms of manpower as well as equipment.

This has been accepted by the Directorate of Medical Education and Research (DMER) in a compliance report filed recently in the Bombay high court with reference to the 23 remedial measures laid down by the court 20 months ago to prevent theft of babies from government or semi-government hospitals and corporation hospitals.

The report takes a stock of hospitals associated with 14 government medical colleges across the state including Mumbai’s Grant Medical College, JJ Hospital, St George Hospital and Cama and Albless Hospital. Though the report claims that 80-90% work pertaining to implementation of the guidelines has been completed in most of the hospitals, a chart attached with each hospital’s details tells a different story.

Report claims that all the remaining work is pending due to shortage of manpower and equipment.

It also mentions a proposal for additional manpower and equipment having been sent to the government in January 2009.

However, clearance is awaited.

While facilities in the lesser developed districts are quite outdated, even Mumbai seems to be slow in catching up with advanced technologies and security systems. Most of the pending work adheres to installation of required number of CCTV cameras, LCD and DVD players as well as public address systems and even providing walkie-talkies to all security guards.

Cama and Albless Hospital, one of the terrorists’ targets in the 26/11 attacks, is still not covered with CCTV cameras at all the entry and exit routes as well as its sensitive areas. The reason quoted blames it on the proposal still being scrutinised after submission. At St George Hospital, due to shortage of manpower, neither are security guards present outside neonatal, postnatal and paediatric wards round the clock nor do they check baggage of visitors on exit as mentioned in the high court guidelines.

There are no female security guards in neonatal, postnatal and paediatric wards either. At St George the visitors’ register is also not maintained. Neither of the two hospitals have the photographs, addresses and other particulars of their security guards.

While JJ Hospital seems high on CCTVs and security guards, it is seen falling short in equipment in the said report.

In October, the kidnapping of two-month-old Ayushman Mishra from VN Desai Hospital had again raised the question regarding security arrangements at government/semi-government and civic hospitals.

DNA had visited nine out of 11 civic hospitals to assess the reality of claims made by BMC in its affidavit dated September 2009.

However, its claims of adhering to all guidelines were found to be false.