Government Medical College and Associated Hospitals Jammu has notified duty roster of its senior doctors and faculty members for COVID19 wards today, more than a month after the second wave of the pandemic assumed dangerous proportions in this region of the Union Territory.
Amidst massive public concern over rising number of fatalities in Jammu owing to alleged casual approach of senior doctors, Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha, had repeatedly directed the concerned authorities to ensure that senior doctors take the frontline in COVID19 management.
Following this, on 17th May, Atal Dulloo, Financial Commissioner, Health and Medical Education, had shot off a letter to Dr Shashi Sudhan Sharma, Principal and Dean, GMC Jammu desiring frequent visits in the COVID19 Wards by the senior doctors. The roster duty order comes a week later.
“Attendants have been desperately accusing senior doctors of GMC&AHJ of not attending to the COVID19 patients. Patients are being administered treatment without proper examination of their case. There have been instances when there was no senior doctor, but postgraduate students, for tracheal intubation of patients. Such state of affairs in patient care has led to worsening of cases and even spurt in deaths which is visible in everyday bulletin,” says an aggrieved resident of Jammu who has lost his dear one to COVID19 recently.
He adds, “The officials at the helm of affairs are simply passing the buck. The second wave hit the region around mid-April and the roster is being prepared now. Who is to be blamed for all the deaths that have happened until now? The doctors’ lobby? The incompetence of officials?”
The roster has a team of atleast three members for each COVID19 designated areas categorised into – High Dependency Unit, Isolation and Disaster; Ward 03, 07, CCU and Neurosurgery; Ward 04, 05 and 11; Ward 01, 02, and Spinal; Ward 12, 14 and 15; Super Speciality Hospital; Maternal and Child Care Hospital Gandhi Nagar; Chest Diseases and Psychiatric Hospital.
These teams, responsible for management of patients and ensuring implementation of the treatment plan, shall be on duty for three days, and take joint round of their assigned areas twice a day.
The teams shall ensure the log entries/submission of details in a prescribed format in the control room, daily between 08 pm to 11 pm, regarding new admissions, discharges, deaths, complications etc. in their assigned areas. When changing duties, they are expected to properly hand over the charge in the best interest of patient care.
An Anaesthesia Consultant has been added to the teams notified for High Dependency Unit, Isolation and Disaster; Ward 03, 07, CCU and Neurosurgery; Ward 04, 05 and 11.
Also, a team of faculty members will be kept reserved, to be put into use at short notice in case any of the faculty members is not available due to any unavoidable circumstances.
Concerned Medical Superintendents of Associated Hospitals Jammu have been asked to ensure the availability of PPE kits etc required for proper working of the teams at all times.
The order further reads that the management of COVID19 patients in GMCH and SSH shall be under the overall supervision of HoD Medicine while HoD CD & TB will supervise patients admitted in CD & TB, PSY and MCH and HoD Paediatrics will supervise patients admitted in SMGS Hospital.
The management plan has been made the responsibility of the Physician consultant, as per the latest protocol duly revised and updated under the guidance of HoD Medicine and HoD CD & TB, whereas the senior most faculty other than the Medicine specialist has been made responsible for ensuring execution of the treatment plan and all the documentation. The third member shall be responsible for ensuring timely logistics and regulation/ monitoring of oxygen.
If and where there are only two members in a team, the order states that all the work, except management plan, shall be looked after by the second member.
Another resident of Jammu pointed out that GMC&AHJ should take cue from Karnataka which has decided to install CCTVs in government hospitals to ensure transparency.
“Without CCTVs, how will one know that senior doctors went to their assigned ward and attended to the patients?” he asked.
Also: Read my article at The News Now
As second wave recedes, GMC & AHJ notifies duty roster of senior doctors
Published in The News Now on 26th May, 2021
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