Sunday, 8 p.m. The man lay spread-eagled on the Osmangunj road, blood oozing from his body. Curious onlookers gathered around him but none dared to take the initiative to rush him to hospital. It was a road mishap as the two-wheelers nearby suggested.
As precious moments ticked by, a Good Samaritan came forward and shifted the injured person in an autorickshaw to the nearby Osmania General Hospital. Banish the idea if you thought the man was fortunate to get quick medicare.
Meanwhile, the overzealous security guards at the casualty ward insisted the accompanying person to reveal his name and address. The latter simply vanished into thin air.
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The auto driver, who shifted the injured, was so scared that he simply brought him back to the accident spot probably to drop him there and flee. But by then a good number of people had gathered and wanted to take the injured man back to the hospital. And they did in the same autorickshaw.
How insensate and thoughtless the hospital authorities could be was evident yet again. There was no urgency on the part of the staff to attend to the injured when he was brought for the second time. They were only concerned about the formalities to be completed before the injured could be taken in.
This made many who came along slip away. Finally the OGH authorities admitted the man after one person gave his name as Mohan Lal. Shockingly, it was nearly an hour after he met with the accident that the man was shifted to the casualty ward and from there to the Acute Neuro Surgical Unit (ANSU) room number 115.
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When this reporter went to ANSU to check, the unconscious man was lying on the floor of the ANSU ward. There were two or three vacant beds, yet the man was left on the floor. When questioned the nursing staff maintained that they did not have any workers to shift him to the beds.
Meanwhile, the man’s brother, Kalappa, contacted the Begum Bazar police who directed them to go to Osmania Hospital, where he identified the unconscious man as his brother Sathi. It was only after his family members came to the hospital that Sathi was shifted to a bed.
It is precisely this uncaring attitude that comes in the way of people lending a helping hand in shifting accident victims to hospitals.
Of course authorities cite rules to justify their stand on disclosure of personal details when the injured is not brought by the 108 ambulance. But couldn’t all this wait when time is running out and seconds matter for the casualty?
Bitter experience
Sometime ago, G. Anji Babu, a Ph.D student from Potti Sreeramulu Telugu University, had a similar bitter experience when he tried to help a mentally-challenged boy near Osmania University gate who was having repeated epileptic attacks.
“We immediately called the 108 ambulance but the attendant insisted that someone must accompany the boy or else he won’t be taken to a hospital.
When I volunteered to go along with, the Gandhi Hospital staff refused to admit the boy saying that a written confirmation from the police was needed acknowledging him as “unknown,” said Anji Babu.
He had to make rounds of the police station cursing himself all the while for getting into this with no stake of his own.
Utter negligence
There is no end to the insensitivity. On Tuesday, a labourer, Krishnamurthy, had to content himself by lying outside the outpatient block of the OGH as the hospital staff refused to allow him in. Down with high fever, the man lay curled up with a water bottle for a pillow.
It was only after The Hindu lens man began shooting his pictures that the OGH staff hurriedly took him inside. But the shutterbug’s efforts to trace him later failed. The authorities refused to say where the patient was admitted.
If you have tears prepare to shed them now.
With reports from Asif Yar Khan and M. Sai Gopal