The District Government Maternity and Children’s Hospital has stopped functioning and all the inpatients and outpatients of the hospital are being referred to the newly constructed 200-bed Koosamma Shambhu Shetty Memorial Haji Abdullah Mother and Child (KSSMHAMC) Hospital here from Tuesday. The State government had, in August 2016, allowed the BRS Health and Research Institute, owned by B.R. Shetty, an NRI businessman hailing from Udupi, to construct a 200-bed maternity and children’s hospital, a 400-bed super-specialty hospital, and an urban community health centre, under public-private partnership mode.
These two hospitals and the health centre were to come up on the four acres of land in the heart of the city, where the 70-bed Government Maternity and Children’s Hospital was located. The 200-bed hospital has been constructed and is operational.
The handing over of the land, donated by the philanthropist and founder of Corporation Bank late Haji Abdullah Saheb (1882-1935) for the District Maternity and Children’s Hospital, had kicked up a controversy as some organisations had questioned the government’s move.
District Surgeon Madhusudhan Nayak told The Hindu that the inpatients and outpatients of the District Government Maternity and Children’s Hospital were told to receive treatment at KSSMHAMC from Tuesday as per the State government’s orders. The patients will continue to receive treatment free at KSSMHAMC Hospital.
The District Maternity and Children’s Hospital had been closed down. Some equipment from the closed hospital had been shifted to the Government Hospital at Kolhar in Vijayapura district. The remaining equipment would be moved to the District Government Hospital here, and other government hospitals in the district, where they were was required, he said.
There were three gynaecologists, two paediatricians and 27 staff members, including nine nurses, and lab technicians and Group D employees, working at the government hospital. Of them, two gynaecologists and two paediatricians have been deputed to the KSSMHAMC Hospital for a period of two months.
“We have urged the State government to shift the other 27 staff members working at the government hospital to the District Government Hospital at Ajjarkad here as we are suffering from staff shortage,” Dr. Nayak said.
A five-member committee under the Deputy Commissioner of Udupi district as chairman would be monitoring the working of the KSSMHAMC Hospital, which will run on public-private partnership mode. The KSSMHAMC Hospital has its own staff in place, he said.
