Delayed renovation has resulted in the Mahatma Gandhi Hospital in Parel treating patients in an ICU with buckets to collect leaking rain water; the operation theatre has also been shut for two weeks
Delayed renovation has resulted in the Mahatma Gandhi Hospital in Parel treating patients in an ICU with buckets to collect leaking rain water; the operation theatre has also been shut for two weeks
WOULD you like to see your loved ones admitted to a hospital that has a leaking roof in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and a non-functioning operation theatre (OT)?
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That, however, is exactly what the situation is at the Mahatma Gandhi hospital in Parel, which comes under the Employee State Insurance Corporation scheme of the central government.
When MiD DAY visited the hospital, we were shocked to see five patients admitted to the leaking ICU.
Equally surprising was the fact that the hospital lacks such basic infrastructure despite being accorded the status of a post-graduate teaching institute.
The ICU had leaks in several places and the ward boys had even kept buckets to gather the water.
The hospital has also had to refuse admission to emergency cases and transfer serious patients to other hospitals due to the lack of a functioning operation theatre.
"We don't have an option but to be admitted here. Doctors have been telling us that the hospital's condition is bad because it is being renovated," said a patient.
MiD DAY found that the renovation in question has been going on for over a year and the contractors appointed for the job are way behind schedule.
"The hospital renovation was to take place in phases and the new wing, which will house an operation theatre complex and an ICU, was supposed to be ready by the middle of this year.
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Now, however, it seems it will take at least one more year for the new OT complex to be ready," said a senior doctor from the hospital.
The OT, which is on the second floor of the hospital, has been shut for nearly two weeks owing to water from the washroom above it leaking into the operation theatre.
"Using the OT in such a state will only worsen the patient's condition owing to the fungus-laden walls," added the doctor.
Authorities' take
Dr Nimish Shah, Medical Superintendent, Gandhi Hospital, said, "We have an operation theatre complex capable of performing five operations at a time, but we have had to shut it owing to leaks.
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Some 20 surgeries have been postponed, which will be conducted once the OT is open again. All emergency patients have been shifted to KEM hospital. We have repainted the entire OT and plugged all leaks."
Commenting on the ICU, Dr Shah said, "The current ICU is a makeshift one and we aren't admitting any serious patients. Once the renovation is complete, ours will be one of the biggest hospitals in Parel."
The hospital is all set to be a 560-bed multi-speciality facility. "It is a major renovation and, thus, the work will take time.
But, as a policy decision, we did not shut the hospital completely and have five functional wards through which we are managing to take care of the patients," added Dr Shah.
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