Power cut led to death of two patients at Vijayawada's NGGH, allege relatives
VIJAYAWADA: The death of two patients on ventilator in the New Government General Hospital near NTR University of Health Sciences here, within minutes after power disruption due to gales on Wednesday night triggered protest from the relatives of the deceased. They alleged that neither was there power backup to the ventilator nor were the generators in functional condition.
While the relatives blamed the deaths on lack of power backup, the hospital authorities claimed that the condition of the patients deteriorated leading to their death.
One of the deceased, 22-year-old Kanna Varaprasad of Poranki in Vijayawada, was admitted to the GGH on June 9, after he met with a road accident. Since then, he had been kept on ventilator in the trauma care unit. According to hospital authorities, he suffered from Diffuse Axonal Injury, a case severe trauma, and died at 9.36 pm on Wednesday following deterioration in his condition.
his photo at New Government
General Hospital in Vijayawada on
Thursday.
Kanna Venkata Ramana, a relative of Varaprasad, blamed the death on lack of power backup to the ventilator. “The doctors are now claiming that his condition was critical and died. But in reality, he had been conscious and he responded to us in the last two days. When he was brought to the hospital, he was serious and the doctors took our signatures on the statement that described his condition as critical. After the power cut, the generators were not switched on and we could clearly see the suffering of the patient. We asked them to switch on the generators and before they did, we lost our child.” he told TNIE.
Varaprasad worked in a private firm in Hyderabad and used to visit his mother and two sisters during weekends. He was the sole breadwinner of the family. His father passed away two years ago.
Another patient who died at 9.39 pm, minutes after Varaprasad’s end came in the sane trauma care ward, was Adinarayana, a 50-year-old man from Vijayawada. He was admitted to the GGH on June 11, with a severe head injury which he suffered in a road accident.
The hospital authorities said Adinarayana also died after his condition deteriorated and refuted the allegations of the relatives that non-functioning of generators and lack of power backup were the reasons behind the two deaths.
Speaking to TNIE, J Narasimha Naik, Resident Medical Officer, New GGH, said, “We have three units of 150 KV generators. There was a power cut at 9 pm and the generators were switched on in just three minutes. Even in worst case scenario they can last at least 30 minutes. By the time deaths took place, power supply was restored and they had nothing to do with power cut.”