Surprise visit to GMC&H: J&K LG directs senior officers to tend to Covid patients
During the visit, Sinha took a round of different medical units and took stock of the medicare services extended to patients
Taking cognizance of the complaints from the general public regarding various issues including, the shortage of oxygen in Government Medical College and Hospital (GMC&H) Jammu, lieutenant governor(LG) Manoj Sinha on Tuesday paid a surprise visit to the hospital and took stock of the medicare services extended to Covid and other patients.

During the visit, Sinha took a round of different medical units and enquired about the availability of necessary equipment and other facilities required for patient care. He directed the concerned officers to rationalise the resources and resolve the prevalent issues. He also said that ‘senior doctors should attend to Covid patients’.
He also conducted a meeting with senior officers and was informed that the requisite supply of oxygen was restored, and there was no shortage of oxygen at present.
During the visit, Sinha was accompanied by chief secretary BVR Subrahmanyam; financial commissioner health Atal Dulloo; principal secretary to L-G Nitishwar Kumar; divisional commissioner Sanjeev Verma; IGP Jammu Mukesh Singh; GMC&H principal Dr Nasib Chand Digra; administrator associated hospitals Nagendra Singh Jamwal, and other senior officers.
Amid a spike in Covid deaths in Jammu, a three-member team of experts from the union health ministry visited the GMC&H on September 19 to ascertain the triggers and suggest corrective measures reverse the trend. The patient care had been severely hit at the hospital, which had become a battlefield for senior doctors and the incumbent principal Dr Nasib Chand Digra.
Peeved over indiscipline and chaos, Dr Digra had recently written a two-page letter to Sinha opting for a voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) because of the interference in working of the hospital by ‘extra-institutional officials’. He, however, didn’t name them in the letter.
Attendants of Covid patients had recently complained of a shortage of oxygen cylinders and the unavailability of beds at the GMC&H.
A video had also gone viral wherein paramedics were seen escaping out of windows, leaving behind patients at the mercy of God at an isolation ward of the hospital.

E-Paper

