E-Paper
Trauma sans nursing!
TWO YEARS have gone by but the KGMU?s Trauma Centre doesn?t have nurses for critical patients here. Attempts in this direction could not give out results. Initiatives fell victim to the tussle between the KGMU administration and the Rajkiya Nurses? Association.
TWO YEARS have gone by but the KGMU’s Trauma Centre doesn’t have nurses for critical patients here. Attempts in this direction could not give out results. Initiatives fell victim to the tussle between the KGMU administration and the Rajkiya Nurses’ Association.
Trauma Centre requires 64 nurses. At present, it has 3 sister-in-charges and 9 staff nurses deputed specifically for the Operation Theatre. But the requirement is much more to give patients the much needed nursing care at wards.
The nurses working at KGMU are appointed from the health department directorate. As nurses come under a direct supervision of the superintendent of the Gandhi Memorial and Allied Hospital, KGMU wanted to make appointment of nurses at Trauma Centre separate from hospital services.
For this, efforts started in January 2004 and fresh posts were created on February 5, 2004 for. This was on the ground that critical cases come here round the clock and the KGMU administration does not want any hindrance in patient care here. There were 54 posts of staff nurses and 10 posts of sisters created through a government order.
KGMU framed a proposal and even a new Nursing Cadre Rules. The rules were first tabled at the Executive Council meet and after an approval from EC, the KGMU presented it before the chancellor.
When asked, an English translation of the rules was also prepared but all exercise went in vain, as the matter could not be materialised till now. The nursing association termed these appointments as against the existing system at KGMU.
“There are 300 staff nurses and 89 sisters working in various departments of the hospital. Is the Trauma Centre something out of the KGMU that they want to appoint nurses other than the nursing cadre?” general secretary of Rajkiya Nurses Association Ashok Kumar asked.
He argued that the centre is nothing but an expansion and upgradation of surgical emergency to include Neurosurgery and Orthopaedics, so it still is a part of the KGMU.
Trauma Centre initially had 48 beds but on its second anniversary ten more beds were added to enhance its capacity. But each time KGMU attempts to move the file for appointment of nurses ahead, the matter goes back to bite the dust.
Nurses are known for their caring nature and patients at Trauma Centre need them most. But patients here don’t even know they have been deprived of the ‘Indian Florence Nightingales’ just for the tussle
between association and administration.
