Doctors from Government Hospitals from across the 13 districts of Andhra Pradesh have been referred to Nizam Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS), for specialist’s medical attention. But, they were turned away due to lack of bed strength at NIMS.
Lakshi (name changed), a girl of 12 years of age has been referred to Nizam Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS) from Visakhapatnam district for chemotherapy. She, along with her parents have been staying outside and taking treatment as an out-patient. It was not that Lakshmi alone, but, there were scores of such patients referred by various hospitals from across the 13 districts of Andhra Pradesh to NIMS, for specialist’s medical attention.
But, what these patients face was that due to lack of the much needed bed strength the NIMS has been denying them to admit them as in-patients and to extend specialist medical services. On the top of it, the Arogya Sri Trust (AST) which provides to the poor to avail free treatment at NIMS and other corporate hospital has not been revised its rate card for medical services for last couple of years. This has further aggravated the situation that availing treatment has much depends on the discretion of the doctors and NIMS. “Though NIMS could not deny extending specialists treatment to the people from Telangana under AST, it has been finding it difficult to accommodate to those coming from AP,” said a senior surgeon from the premier medical institution. Adding further, “we don’t have adequate bed strength even to meet the inflow of patients coming from the 10 districts of Telangana, and every day the NIMS has been forced to turn away about 20 to 30 such patients coming from both Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.”
Pointing at the root cause of the problem, a former senior official of the AST told, “The main issue was prior to the bifurcation of the State, NIMS has been rated as the top institution. And, the entire concentration of the successive government’s had been guided by a misplaced vision. So, they did not bother to create NIMS like institutions in the government sector in anywhere in Andhra Pradesh. Yes, there were institutions like Sri Venkateswara Institute for Medical Sciences (SVIMS). But, all the time the government expects it was the Tirumala Tirupathi Devasthanam Board (TTD) to support the SVIMS with its financial muscle. There were incidents in which the TTD had been asked to pay the salaries to the SVIMS staff. But, they never bothered to strengthen it on the lines of NIMS. So, people come from all corners of Andhra Pradesh to NIMS.
After introducing AST during the Congress regime of Y S Rajasekhara Reddy, it was the corporate hospitals who had ruled the show. So, the focus of the government on improving the medical institutions in the government sector for last ten years, prior to the bifurcation of the state had gone to winds. Thus, some of the prestigious medical colleges like the King George Hospital in Visakhapatnam, medical college hospitals in Kurnool and Guntur were not given the attention that they needed.
The skewed policy of the leaders to give a fillip to the development of every institution, every sector in Hyderabad has been still hunting the people who needed specialist medical care. And, they were forced to travel long distances from across the 13 districts of Andhra Pradesh to seek specialist medical attention at NIMS, the sources added.
The state government may pat itself for getting an All India Institute of Medial Sciences (AIMS) as part of the Andhra Pradesh State Re-organisation Act. But, until the premier institution takes its full shape, does people from the state will have to wait, when doctors from different hospitals in Andhra Pradesh continue to refer the cases to NIMS? This is in precise, one of many issues befall on the people of the state due to gross negligence of their leaders. Yet, the leaders and their heirs continue to claim that “their” and “their great leaders” regime in united AP was a gold era.
