There is perhaps no other acreage in Egmore that is as filled with hope as this hospital. The Institute of Obstetrics and Gynaecology (IOG) and Government Hospital for Women and Children, fondly called MH (maternity hospital) by generations of doctors, nurses, students and allied staff is a tertiary healthcare centre. Age (it is nearly 180-years old) has not defeated its ranks and it has gone above and beyond doing what it was first founded for in 1844 – delivering babies.
An old photograph of the Maternity Hospital | Photo Credit: Special arrangement
It was established on the banks of the Cooum near the Egmore Railway Station under the superintendentship of stalwarts such as Drs WS Thompson and James Shaw — who instituted a professorship in midwifery at the Madras Medical College — but moved to its present location on Pantheon Road in the 1880s because of the annual flooding of the river. The black wrought iron gates open under an arched, flagstone-paved, pagoda-topped wing that once housed the outpatient clinics, into a quadrangle filled with the crush of humanity. Fathers hold new-borns swaddled in comforters, expectant mothers rest on bucket chairs and a surge of relatives moves places every time the cleaning staff engages in their work. A posse of policewomen keeps a keen lookout from the police post inside the premises.
Dr K Kalaivani | Photo Credit: Thamodharan Bharath
“This was the first allopathic maternity hospital in British India,” says Dr K Kalaivani, Director, IOG. “When it was constructed the buildings resembled the shape of a woman’s pelvis and sacrum. But over the years portions were demolished to make way for multi-rise buildings that could accommodate more patients.”
The verdant campus that spans between Pantheon Road and Halls Road where the Institute of Child Health and Hospital for Children now stands is chock-o-block with departments for psychiatric counselling, endocrinology, cytology, family planning and assisted reproductive technology. “Most deliveries conducted here are for high-risk patients,” says Dr Kalaivani, seated in her office that opens into a road that houses the Police Hospital.
Dr AL Mudaliar, first Indian superintendent of the hospital, speaks at the gallery classroom of the Gifford School | Photo Credit: Special arrangement
An honour roll showcases the names that helmed this august institution; Dr AL Mudaliar was the first Indian to head the hospital in the years before the Second World War. A scan of portraits of other taciturn chiefs reveals that the first woman director for this hospital for women was appointed only in 1984.
The gallery classroom at Gifford school | Photo Credit: S Shiva Raj
“Today, doctors number 85, post-graduates 55, nursing staff 244 and support staff such as dieticians, yoga instructors and utility service staff around 500. This team meets the logistics of the nearly 15,000 deliveries annually. Over the years the hospital has delivered the exiled queen, Supayalat, of Burma in the late 1800s, and also actors such as Vijay,” says Dr Kalaivani.
Earlier, the red brick wings had large high-ceiling rooms, broad verandahs that let the breeze in, and a long corridor from the labour rooms lined with Rangoon creepers that led to a statue of a mother and child. Today, much of that has been replaced by a waiting area and the AL Mudaliar block.
The Gifford School | Photo Credit: S Shiva Raj
One corner of the hospital still remains untouched. The Gifford School named for Major General Gifford, a former superintendent of the hospital. Set up in 1911, the two-storey building has perhaps the most fascinating specimens preserved in glass jars and obstetric instruments that would today be regarded as belonging to a mediaeval torture chamber. The school also has a white tiled gallery classroom from where students observe clinical demonstrations.
Specimens at the Gifford School | Photo Credit: S Shiva Raj
Former Director, Dr Radha Bai Prabhu’s keen interest in medical history led to her unearthing these instruments in a story that rivals the search for the Holy Grail.
Dr Radha Bai Prabhu | Photo Credit: Special arrangement
“It began with revamping the specimens of abnormal foetuses, largely preserved as examples of congenital anomalies. Some were as old as 60 years. While working on them we discovered a room leading to the underbrush behind the school that had many wooden boxes. That’s where we found these fascinating obstetric instruments, some belonging to the 16th Century. We had as many as possible dated by firms in the UK that had once manufactured them.”
Obstetric instruments at the Gifford school | Photo Credit: S Shiva Raj
The hospital has to its credits many firsts including hosting the first All-India Obstetrics and Gynaecological Congress in 1936. But it is the low gables, sunny verandahs, the constant ringing of the temple bell and the cooing sound of new-borns that gives this grand old place the feel of home.
