Jharkhand’s premier hospital — Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) — is running X-ray units without permission and has been warned for ignoring regulations of obtaining licence for running similar machines. Unusual for the premier Government-owned institution, but the revelation was made after a three-member team from Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) made surprise check and issued stern warnings to the administration.
The three-member team of AERB reached here on Monday to ascertain compliance with the rules for running scanning machines that use rays of specific frequency in diagnostic processes. The team would be checking similar compliance and violations in other Government and private hospitals in Ranchi. The team sealed three X-ray units of RIMS.
“We found that three X-ray units were running without licence from AERB for one year. We have sealed those machines and have issued warning for 10 other machines running without licence,” said Scientific Officer of AERB Pradeep Kumar.
The AERB’s team warned RIMS administration for flouting the norms for 10 machines, including CT Scan, MRI machines and asked the administration to obtain licence within a month else those machines will be sealed too. The team would also be checking compliance at other hospitals in Ranchi. The team is headed by BK Singh and includes HG Deshate, both scientific officers, in the team.
“Today we inspected RIMS; now we will focus on other Government hospitals. After that, we will check private hospitals also,” maintained Kumar.
Ironically, RIMS’ administration appeared unaware about over a dozen machines running without licence. The machines were maintained at Radiology department where a notice has been pasted by the visiting team. The newly-appointed director expressed that he too was unaware of the non-compliance.
“If there is no licence, then we will obtain licences for those machines. We will assess up to what level our functioning will be affected,” said Director of RIMS, Bl Sherwal.
The surprise visit created a state of confusion at RIMS where around 200 X-ray, 50 CT scans and nearly a dozen MRI of patients is done almost every day. However, impact of three machines after getting sealed is yet to be assessed but was not denied either by the RIMS administration.