Moody, angry and often aloof nurses at the top two State-run tertiary hospitals in Telangana, Gandhi and Osmania General Hospitals (OGH) is very common. There are numerous occasions when patients recovering in in-patient wings or intensive care units wait for hours for the nurses to show up. While the wait continues, the nurses do not show up. Blaming nurses for lack of ‘humane’ treatment is natural. However, the fact also remains that there is a serious health care delivery crisis in the top two tertiary hospitals, which have a combined strength of close to 3,000 beds. And it all boils down to shortage of nurses. The nursing staff shortage has all but crippled inpatient wards, intensive care units, dialysis units, outpatient facilities, vital cardiology, kidney and orthopaedic units and recovery wards in the two hospitals.
It (shortage) has also put immense pressure on the existing nurses, virtually draining out enthusiasm, motivation or passion towards their work. “Before blaming nurses for lack of humane treatment, one must understand the kind of pressure under which they function at OGH and Gandhi. It’s a shame that each nurse at both these hospitals has to work twice or thrice the normal duty time. The last time anybody bothered to recruit a nurse in Telangana and AP was way back in 2007,” says secretary, All India Nurses Federation, K. Sujavathi. Typically, OGH and Gandhi hospitals work in three shifts (morning, midday and night) and for each shift, both require close to 300 nurses, which accounts to 900 nurses for each hospital. However, OGH has a total of just 300 nurses, which means for one shift in a day, there will be only 100 available nurses to look after over 2,000 patients (outpatient and inpatient included). At Gandhi Hosptial, there are 200 nurses employed on permanent basis while 200 more are on contract basis.
This translates to 400 nurses instead of the required 900. “The situation is even bad if you look at the district hospital in King Koti or the three area hospitals in Vanasthalipuram, Golconda and Nampally. Depending on the patient inflow, each of the three area hospitals require between 40 and 50 nurses. However, at present each hospital has 20 nurses or less than that,” says Mariya from Telangana Government Nurses Association. It’s not like the State government does know the ground realities. Past proposals to recruit nurses on contract or permanent basis have not taken off.“There is no Nursing Council of Nursing Directorate on the lines of Medical Council to govern nurses in Telangana State. There is no interest on the part of the State government to recruit nurses from Telangana even after formation of a separate State,” is a very common refrain among them.
Recent Random Post:
