Nagpur: Taking serious note of the complaints about absence of competitive doctors at Intensive Care Units (ICUs) of the government hospitals during night hours, the state government has now decided to refurbish the system to better the doctor-patient relationship and improvise services.
Dr KR Sonpure, officer on special duty (OSD) for medical education and public health, has asked all the medical colleges in the state to submit staff availability, right from junior residents, senior residents and teachers in each department requiring an intensive care unit at the earliest. He has written a letter to the principal secretary and director of medical education and research department.
The information is being sought to develop state-of-the-art ICUs (medicine, gynaecology, surgical, orthopaedics, paediatrics etc in each) at GMCHs in Maharashtra with adequate junior and senior qualified staff as well as available infrastructure.
“Currently, in every GMCH the patients are admitted to ICUs by the doctors on duty on that particular day. This creates a gap between the treating doctor and the doctor who has admitted the patient. The doctor who admits comes only once on round and prescribes treatment, whereas the treating doctor is someone else. Also, there is no senior doctor round the clock,” said Dr Sonpure.
With the new scheme, each ICU will have special units of doctors comprising junior resident, senior resident, lecturer and associate professor so that senior doctors are also available round the clock. Also, the residents will be able to take difficult decisions in the presence of seniors.
“Since each special unit will be posted for at least three months in a particular ICU, it will give them good experience by following the treatment on a patient for a long time. This will improve their skills as well,” said Dr Sonpure.
The proposed idea will also help in fulfilling the norms of the Medical Council of India (MCI), both of staff and infrastructure. Hence, it will indirectly raise the standard of the medical college. The scheme has provision of a dependency unit and a transportable ventilator from the casualty to the ICU.
“Sometimes, it takes about half an hour or more for serious patients to reach from the casualty to ICU. Hence, there should be enough portable ventilators to make the system effective,” said Dr Sonpure.
He has first sought the staff position so that the deficiency could first be fulfilled before starting the project at GMCHs
