Pune: As lakhs of employees in the state are striking over the implementation of the ‘old pension scheme', Sassoon General Hospital in Pune is also facing the heat of it. Hundreds of employees at the hospital are striking, but as they say, “the show must go on”, it is the dean Dr Sanjiv Thakur who is ensuring that the patients visiting and admitted here do not suffer. The hospital has outsourced 100 nurses and 100 class four employees to run the show.
Similarly, the resident doctors too are working round the clock. The para-medical staff is ensuring that the patients are getting their medicines and food on time. We have a stock of medicines.
Dr Thakur attending OPDs too
Dr Thakur too is attending the patients at OPD’s along with performing the surgeries. While talking to the Free Press Journal he said, “Here we treat every day as an emergency. So even if the strike is going on we are working on a war footing to ensure the patients are not inconvenienced.
The hospital is full with all 1200 beds fully occupied. The resident doctors are ensuring that the patients are monitored regularly. The hospital has outsourced 100 nurses and 100 class four employees for the smooth functioning of the hospital”, he informed.
“The process of getting the people on the contract is going on. It is difficult to get them, as they have to leave their earlier job and other complexities too are involved. After the decision to outsource the employees, nearly 30% seats have been filled at Sassoon”, he said. Since the teaching at the medical college is not happening, the students too are helping us and junior resident doctors are running the show”, he added.
Currently, 500 resident doctors and 200 nursing students are running the show. Over 1,000 patients visited various OPDs in the hospital. “I am also seeing the patients at the OPD, " he said, adding that they have also performed emergency surgeries.
"I have got a good team"
There are three types of surgeries, planned, cancer patient and emergency. We have to take the emergency surgeries followed by the Cancer patient as it involves long procedures and then the planned ones”, he said. "You cannot predict how long a surgery can go on, few are simple ones which get over in a few minutes while few are complex and take hours together. So, it is difficult to say how many surgeries took place in a day during the strike”, he said.
Appreciating the efforts of his colleagues, he said, “I have got a good team”.
