GUNTUR: The Department of Neurology at the Guntur Government General Hospital (GGH) was set up more than 50 years ago with the sanctioned posts of one professor and an assistant professor. Even today, it is being run by two specialist doctors despite increased number of patients.
The departments of Neurosurgery, Cardiology, Gastroenterology, Nephrology and other speciality wings at the GGH are also facing the same fate.
As per the norms of the Medical Council of India (MCI), every unit should have at least four doctors, including one professor, an associate professor and two assistant professors, but the super speciality departments at the GGH do not have the sufficient staff.
Hence they are facing problems. For instance, the department of Neurology has a 60-bed unit with a faculty strength of one professor and an assistant professor.
This pales in comparison to the bed strength of the Neurology department in AIIMS, New Delhi, which boasts of 80 beds and a faculty strength of 13. Further, AIIMS New Delhi has 20 doctors in the department of Cardiology, eight doctors in the department of Gastroenterology but in GGH, the departments of Neurology, Cardiology and Gastroenterology have two, three and one doctor respectively.
This is indicative of the acute shortage that GGH faces when it comes to staffers. The number of outdoor patients visiting the super speciality departments has shot up in the past few decades. On an average, over 1,200 outpatients visit the Neurology department a week. But the department has only one professor and an assistant professor.
There is immense pressure on the doctors as cases involving Neurology, Cardiology and other departments are very complex. Though the infrastructure has improved in various departments, vacant technician posts are yet to be filled.
The department of Neurology has a sleep lab, but it is run by part-time technicians and their salaries are paid from the donations collected from the philanthropists. Often treatment gets delayed due to the delay in test reports.
There are students pursuing DM super speciality courses, but due to the shortage of staff, the senior doctors are mostly engaged in patient care and hardly get time to conduct classes. Students are left to study on their own and hardly two to three classes are taken per week.
GGH Neurology HoD Dr NV Sundara Chary stressed the need to set up three separate units, including a separate unit for Pediatric Neurology within the department of Neurology as it has all the facilities. He opined that the government hospitals cannot be run only with the help of donors.
Docs under immense pressure
There is immense pressure on the doctors as cases involving Neurology, Cardiology and other departments are very complex.
Though the infrastructure has improved in various departments, vacant technician posts are yet to be filled
The department of Neurology has a sleep lab, but it is run by part-time technicians and their salaries are paid from the donations collected from the philanthropists. Often treatment gets delayed due to the delay in test reports.