HYDERABAD: Shocked at their colleague being assaulted by the grieving relatives of a deceased patient, junior doctors working in the Osmania General Hospital staged a protest on Saturday demanding immediate rearrangement of Telangana State Special Task Force (TSSPF) as per the GO issued approximately three years ago.
Dr Shrikant Sativada, president of the Osmania Junior Doctors Association, said that a junior doctor working in the isolation ward checked a 65-year-old female patient with multiple complications and declared her dead. A relative then slapped the doctor, before being stopped by the security guards present
there.
“The attack on the junior doctor is just one of many dangers that we face daily. A couple of months back, a ward boy in the gynaecology department was attacked,” Dr Shrikant said.
Stating that such incidents are happening on a regular basis, the junior doctors boycotted all elective duties as part of their protest. The State government issued GO 130 in 2019, sanctioning the deployment of 164 personnel in government teaching hospitals and medical health and district units.
Among this 164 personnel, 128, including one Inspector, three SIs, six ASIs, 16 head constables, and 102 constables, were to be deployed to eight government teaching hospitals in the State.
However, the junior doctors say that the GO was never implemented. Complaining about the security lapses, the OGH junior doctors also demanded strict action against those responsible. They also demanded an active committee be set up to investigate and inform regarding the changes that can be implemented in the current system for better security of all doctors working in government hospitals.
SAFETY 1ST FOR DOCTORS
GO 130 was issued by the Telangana government in December when the Union Health Ministry was considering prescribing safety norms for doctors after the weeklong face-off between agitating doctors and the West-Bengal government.