ROURKELA: Even as inordinate delay continues to dog upgradation of the 685-bed Ispat General Hospital (IGH) into Super Speciality Hospital & Medical College (SSHMC), the IGH is now staring at doctors’ crisis.Delivery of quality healthcare has deteriorated at the IGH run by the Rourkela Steel Plant (RSP) of SAIL with superannuation of senior doctors and no commensurate appointment.Recently, the RSP Executives’ Association (RSPEA) president and Steel Executives Federation of India (SEFI) member Bimal Bisi had written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi requesting him to expedite the SSHMC project and also retain senior and experienced doctors with enhancement of retirement age of doctors serving in PSUs to 65 years.
Bisi said IGH at Rourkela provides healthcare to SAIL employees besides the vast population in tribal belts of Odisha, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh.It is equipped with all modern healthcare facilities, has good infrastructure and runs Nurses Training Institute and imparts post-graduate DNB training in multiple disciplines. However, over a period of five years, the strength of doctors has come down to 92 from about 160 and would further reduce to 80 in next two years. There is a shortfall of at least 19 specialist doctors
along with other vacancies, while against the need of 500 para-medics, it is managing with 130.
General secretary of BMS-affiliated Rourkela Ispat Karkhana Karmachari Sangh (RIKKS), the recognised trade union of RSP, HS Bal said the situation is turning grim for IGH. He pointed out that IGH Director Dr KC Mahanta will retire in February 2018 and one month later, the only senior neuro surgeon Dr RN Mohapatra would superannuate. Bal said with mushrooming of private corporate hospitals, doctors are not willing to join SAIL. Three weeks back, Rourkela BJP legislator Dilip Ray had said the SSHMC project was expedited with allocation of `200 crore from the PM’s Swastha Suraksha Yojana, while AIIMS-Bhubaneswar was assigned responsibility to introduce super-specialty services and develop curriculum for the post-graduate courses.SAIL’s neglect of IGH is baffling as it runs seven super speciality hospitals and 17 other hospitals, Bal said.