Shortage of doctors hits medical services at GGH

Chittoor: Patients visiting the district headquarters hospital here are facing lot of inconvenience with shortage of doctors. The AP Vaidya Vidhana Parishad (APVVP) has failed to fill posts of doctors for the last five years despite repeated requests from the hospital officials concerned. The same is the case with regard to vacant nursing staff. Though, the Apollo Hospitals had taken over the Government General Hospital (GGH) under the clinical attachment two years ago, the administration of the entire GGH is still vested with the APVVP only.

Highlights:

• 8,000 out-patients visit the hospital on an average every day
• Vacancies at GGH were not filled for the last five years
  

The maintenance of the GGH with the existing staff has become a herculean task. On an average, 8,000 out-patients visit the GGH every day and it has 350 beds for in-patients.According to official sources, the entire responsibility for running the GGH is vested with the government doctors only and the Apollo Hospitals doctors are confined to extend medical services to some extent.

Speaking to The Hans India here on Tuesday GGH Superintendent Dr Pandu Ragnaiah admitted that the hospital was unable to provide specialty services to patients with shortage of doctors. He stated that the GGH doctors and staff have been staging protests for the past one month demanding the state government to fill the vacant posts.

The superintendent said that it was not fair on the part of the government to introduce biometric system to register the attendance of doctors as they have to attend the call duty at any time. He also said that there was no response from the higher officials to release the funds for taking up renovation of hospital buildings. It is learnt that there was no proper coordination between government doctors and staff of the Apollo Hospitals.

By C Prabhakar Rao