Patients suffer as 20K resident doctors strike work in Delhi
New Delhi: Over 20,000 resident doctors in the national capital on Monday went on mass strike while raising concerns for their security and demanding stringent law and in solidarity with their West Bengal counterparts, leading to postponement of over 4,000 surgeries across Delhi government and civic body-run hospitals, and also left thousands of patients in the lurch with OPD functions being hit.
Doctors at the Centre-run Safdarjung Hospital, Lady Hardinge Medical College and Hospital, RML Hospital, as well as Delhi government facilities such as GTB Hospital, Dr Baba Saheb Ambedkar Hospital, Sanjay Gandhi Memorial Hospital and Deen Dayal Upadhyay Hospital were on strike on Monday.
Fifty-eight-year old Kripa Kaur was at the emergency ward in Safdarjung hospital waiting to undergo surgery but the doctors strike left her waiting for second days. Her relatives are puzzled too as the chaos in the hospital after the doctors strike is too hard for them to bear. This is the second day of the doctors strike at Safdarjung hospital and the patients are left with no other option than to suffer.
"Is this a hospital? for the past two days our patient has not been attended in the Intensive Cardiac- Care Unit. I just want to know what our fault is. Why are we ignored by the doctors," said Gurmeet Kaur, sister in law of Kripa Kaur.
Kripa is not alone; there are hundreds of patients who are bearing the brunt of the doctors strike which has entered its second day.
Another seriously injured patient Nadeem, 21, has been denied on Monday for any medical treatment at Lok Nayak hospital emergency ward. "I am seriously injured, as I have been stabbed. The police brought me to his hospital but security at the emergency gate did not allow me to go inside the casualty ward," said patient Nadeem. However, after the Millennium Post intervention, he has given a preliminary treatment at the hospital.
However, the patient at the emergency wards at GTB hospital, Mohammed Abraak, who had fractured right upper limb, faces the consequence of the strike. "My operation was scheduled for Monday but It has been postponed," said Abraak. Another patient at the same ward, Vipin Kumar Dubey, 25, an cab driver, met with an accident and received multiple fractured at his right upper and lower limp, waiting doctors while alleging that doctors have stopped coming to our wards, only nursing staff come to give medicine.
