Editorial
Criminal negligence in hospitals
Why there was no fall-back supply of electricity?
THE suffering endured by service seekers in a number of government-run hospitals, touched a new low following a10-hour power outage at Sher-e-Bangla Nagar area. It speaks of sheer disregard for patients' lives. They failed to live up to the emergency situation by harnessing the needed logistics and thus mitigating the pain and suffering of the patients. The fact that treatment and emergency surgery were held up and ICU units remained non-functional for hours together for the lack of fuel for generators is simply unacceptable to us. That hospital authorities had no contingency plan whatsoever to face the situation became brazenly evident one more time.
We wonder why major hospitals like Shaheed Suhrawardy Hospital, Dhaka Shishu Hospital, National Institute of Traumatic Orthopaedics and Rehabilitation (NITOR), National Institute of Cardio Vascular Diseases (NICVD) etc should not have foolproof alternate electricity generation system to come to life as soon as there would be a power outage? Do we have to remind the authorities that uninterrupted electricity supply is a prerequisite for operating modern equipment for detecting and monitoring cardio-vascular diseases, run life-support system for critical patients as well as equipment for intensive care units?
We understand all the major hospitals in question have money in the contingency funds just in case they need it; but why some of it was not used to purchase diesel to run generators remains a big question. An efficient management would have set aside bureaucratic formalities at such times and taken the initiative to make the generators operational within minutes. Taking immediate measures to lessen the pain of the patients is the foremost responsibility of the physicians once they land at their doors. We take the occasion to mention that the Hippocratic oath entails the very ethos of the medical profession mitigating suffering of the sick. It is lot more than a commonplace pledge of a professional. The humane part of the medical profession is what makes a physician a revered person in society. But it seems the desired level of concern and compassion in most of our physicians and hospital authorities is an area that needs to be improved.
We hope the Adviser of Health would look into the matter and instruct the ministry officials to make the hospital install a foolproof alternate electricity generation system to avoid human misery in future.
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