CHENNAI: For residents of Kannagi Nagar, Tsunami Nagar, Ezhil Nagar, Semmancheri and Perumbakkam, a medical emergency usually means a race against time and traffic. The nearest government hospitals equipped for critical care, the Government Royapettah Hospital, Gosha Hospital and Omandurar Government Hospital are around 20 km away, roughly an hour’s drive through congested roads.
Nearly 2.5 lakh people live across these resettlement sites but none has a hospital equipped for critical care. The only Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC)-run Urban Community Health Centre at Kannagi Nagar remains short-staffed and ill-equipped to handle emergencies.
This nearly cost a life on June 9, when the condition of 33-year-old Mercy Stephen, then pregnant, turned critical by the time she reached Gosha Hospital. A doctor there told TNIE she survived only after the medical team’s extensive efforts but her foetus did not, due to complications during the pregnancy. Her family and neighbours staged protest at the time, alleging the community health centre had failed to provide timely care because no doctor was available, and pointed to a similar incident about a year earlier. The residents also lost their trust in the UCHC after the latest incident as the facility which had been handling 25 to 30 deliveries a month, recorded six last month (five before the incident and one after it).
The residents said tragedies like this could be prevented if a tertiary care facility existed closer home. “Gosha hospital staff told us that her situation would have been less critical had we come at least 15 minutes earlier. We would have lost her that day. There was so much delay at every stage. There was heavy traffic as well,” said Maria Joseph, Mercy’s mother-in-law.
L Manikandan, an activist from Kannagi Nagar, pointed out every tertiary care facility serving the area sits in central or north Chennai. “Earlier, there was an ambulance stationed outside the community health centre, but it is no longer available. It would help if an ambulance is stationed here because it also takes time to arrive,” he said.
S Chitra, a resident of Semmancheri, said even with a peripheral hospital at Perumbakkam, the residents still have to travel all the way to Royapettah for emergencies.
Corporation Commissioner GS Sameeran, when contacted by TNIE, acknowledged the healthcare facilities currently available in the area are grossly inadequate. “It definitely needs a tertiary care hospital, or a district hospital,” he said.
The Sholinganallur Peripheral Hospital, inaugurated in February this year, was meant to help ease this but TNIE learnt internal infrastructure work remains unfinished. Though built as a 262-bed facility, only 160 beds are currently usable. The hospital runs departments of medicine, surgery, obstetrics and gynaecology, paediatrics, orthopaedics, psychiatry, ENT and ophthalmology but only two doctors have been sanctioned per specialty, against the five that, sources said, are needed to provide emergency care effectively.
Currently, the hospital has around 15 doctors and 15 nurses, which health department sources said, is inadequate even for its existing, non-emergency services. Maternity care alone requires at least five obstetricians to manage round-the-clock deliveries. As a result, the hospital can currently treat only stable patients and perform elective surgeries. Anyone needing emergency or critical care is still referred onward to tertiary hospitals such as Government Royapettah Hospital and Omandurar Government Hospital.
Asked about the shortfall, Director of Medical Education and Research (DME) Dr R Suganthy Rajakumar told TNIE, “We have written to the Chennai corporation regarding recruitment at the peripheral hospital.” To this, a senior corporation official said they had just received a letter, only on WhatsApp and no official intimation has followed since. However, the issue will be looked into, he added.
