Doctors' stir hits out-patients at GHs

This hit the functioning of OP sections at several hospitals, though protesters and hospital administration maintained that the work was not affected because of the protest.

Senior doctors stayed away from work at OPDs during the day, resulting in only skeletal services available at hospitals, especially the bigger institutes, said Dr K Senthil, president of the association. “We know it is not right to run OPDs without senior doctors, but we had to do so. But we still have not received any response from the government,” he said.

Despite the concerns that OPDs could be completely shut down as part of the protest, hospital administrations said it did not affect their operation. “We had the regular number of outpatients at our hospital on Tuesday. It functioned very smoothly and there was not hitch at all,” said Dr R Jayanthi, Dean, Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital (RGGGH). 

The Kilpauk Medical College Hospital, and the Stanley Medical College Hospital, too, did not face any problems in the functioning of OPDs. “More than 4,100 patients visited our OPD on Tuesday and everything functioned smoothly,” said Dr K Vasanthamani, Dean, KMC.

The association claimed it has already informed the public about the protests so that they were not affected, said Dr Senthil. “We reached out to the people by sticking up posters, requesting them to bear with us. We did not receive any complaints from patients or institutions over the protest. It was a total boycott by senior doctors; the work was restricted to that by house surgeons, non-service post graduates and administrators,” he said.

Out-patient (OP) duty at the government hospitals and Primary Health Centres (PHC) in Vellore and Tiruvannamalai was affected after doctors stayed away from work in support of their various demands on Tuesday. Their demands include pay on par with qualification and immediate payment of various pending allowances. While trainee doctors were pressed into service in the Vellore Government Medical College Hospital, lack of doctors at other facilities resulted in out-patients waiting in queues for a long time. At the Vellore Government Pentland Hospital, doctors raised slogans during a demonstration on the premises. The scene was not very different at the government facilities at Tiruvannamalai Cheyyar, Arni, Polur, Chengam and Vandavasi.