That the health sector in Odisha is in a complete mess is not just proved by the SUM Hospital fire and the lapses it brought to the fore but by several other factors to which the State Government has knowingly shut its eyes.
AIIMS: Go any day to this Central Government–run hospital on the city outskirts and you’ll face the harrowing experience of standing in long queues for entry in gate, registration and OPD ticket, taking turn for consulting doctor and buying medicines.
“I had better not come to the hospital at all,” told a skin patient from Angul, not wishing to be named. Narrating his woe there, the 65-year-old man told that he could not take his turn to meet the doctor despite going to the hospital for four days on a stretch braving the mad rush of people and long queues. He told that since early dawn, patients or their caretakers have to stand in several queues to get access to various facilities in the hospital. “Though the fee is nominal, but one needs lots of patience to wait for a turn,” he told. He demanded that the Government must streamline the process lest patients needing emergency care shouldn’t die even before seeing a doctor.
KIDS: Kanungo Institute of Diabetic Specialties, another multi-specialty hospital in city, mostly for diabetes and related diseases too paints a grim picture, when it comes to patient-friendly service. A billboard quoting very nominal price for any test in diabetes greets you at its entrance. But don’t be under the impression that everything is cheap and within in your budget there. The billboard is just to allure you at the first glance, while once you get admitted you are pitted against unimaginable charges for different services and that too, many of them below par.
A patient from Rayagada who too requested anonymity said he had to spend around Rs 30,000 for admission and treatment cost just for four days treatment in the hospital. He explained that cabin charge of the hospital per day is minimum Rs 2,000-Rs 3,000. “The food given is utterly poor, while inflated bills are made for every service,” he said.
Capital Hospital: A patient who managed to meet an orthopedic doctor in the outdoor, said, “After a long hours of wait, finally I was fortunate to meet the doctor.”
He narrated, “I had sprains in one of my feet. The doctor first recommended for X-Ray, which I did. And, the second time I met the doctor with the report, it had been the lunch hour. The doctor saw the report and within no time scribbled down some medicine names. I asked if they are available in the hospital store, but got no answer as the doctor was in a hurry and fumed responding to me. Then I showed the paper to the store manager hesitantly going by the belief that the free medicines are never effective. However, the store in charge told me that the medicines prescribed were not available in the store but medicines of same compositions were available. He made a packet of alternative drugs and handed it over to me. But I was not convinced till I bought the prescribed medicines in a shop in the campus. Coming home I preferred the medicines bought over the free ones. The medicines were over but the sprain and aches were there as they were.
Finally, I thought of taking the free medicines and a
las, within a few days it began to heal!”
Instances of such experiences are galore among the patients who have gone for treatment to any of the much-hyped health centres in the twin cities of Cuttack and Bhubaneswar. The SCB Medical College and Hospital carries loads and loads of charges of harassments and apathy.
It is often alleged Dalals make law in the hospital and patients are forced to make various tests, at times some not necessary, thanks to nexus of doctors with private lab managers. Diversion of patients to private clinics and compelling patients to buy medicines from certain drug stores and baby swapping are just a few of many old allegations in Cuttack. But then, patients continue to fall back on the SCB as it has few peers in the State and all critical cases are referred to here.
Notwithstanding the fact that Odisha has undergone a sea change in the health sector in last several years with the establishment of several multi-specialty hospitals, especially in Bhubaneswar and Cuttack, the grim realities continue to prevail.
For the whole of Odisha and people of the neighbouring States, Bhubaneswar and Cuttack have, of late, become a hub of modern healthcare which used to be the southern India in past, but situations have not improved as mercenary attitude, rather than service mentality, has taken over the hospital management and its staff.
The Government has provided them premium land and several other sops for the establishment of the hospitals and at the same time also laid down certain mandatory norms, but in terms of supervision and monitoring as to whether the corporate hospitals abide by them, laxity is maintained. The result is Shishu Bhawan child deaths, Capital Hospital fan falling, AIIMS trauma and corporate hospital fleecing. As if to add insult to injury, the SUM Hospital fire is just a scrap of the rot that has set in the entire system.
And, to turn to the rural areas, with massive shortage of doctors, healthcare infrastructure, medicines and nonresponsive ambulance system, the less said about the rural health service, the better.