In the aftermath of the recent attacks on doctors of the Government hospitals in Maharashtra, lok Nayak Hospital, one of the largest Government hospitals in the national Capital conducted self-defence training classes for its doctors and paramedical staff. Talking to The Pioneer, Dr JC Passey, Medical Superintendent of the lok Nayak Hospital said, “Starting from April 5, the ten day self-defence training was imparted to our hospital doctors for 2 hours every day at the 7th floor emergency floor (disaster ward). As many as 200 doctors learnt techniques on how to save themselves if confronted with any untoward situation inside the hospital.
Esha Pandey, Deputy Commissioner of Police with the Special Unit for Women and Children said, “two to three trainers who are equipped in brown belt were assigned the task of giving hourly training to the doctors especially women. The idea was to enable the doctors and other hospital staff to learn combative techniques to deal with violence meted out by the relatives of the patients who go through emotional outbursts.”
Talking about the idea of imparting self-defense training, the police officer said that the primary objective was to boost the confidence of the doctors especially the female staff within the hospital premises.
“During the night shift, since most of the female staff find themselves alone in the wards, there are times that the relatives of the patients express violent outbursts. In order to ensure that we feel confident, we were giving basic training in martial arts by the Delhi Police,” said Hema Kumari, a nurse in the hospital.
Weeks ago, doctors at the Deen Dayal Upadhyay (DDU) hospital were allegedly brutally attacked at the emergency ward by the relatives of a patient. Following which, repeated cases of assault on doctors in the Government hospitals had triggered massive strike.