Better late than never. That is what they say about important decisions by authorities which should have been there in place for safety and a secure environment for every section of the society at large. The premise is indeed unfortunate, but we must appreciate the action of the Supreme Court in constituting a National Task Force of doctors to recommend measures to ensure safety in the workplace for medical professionals.
While hearing the infamous RG Kar Hospital rape case, a bench of Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra said that the court was concerned about the “virtual absence of conditions of safety for young doctors in public hospitals, especially women doctors who are more vulnerable because of the nature of work and gender”. The court also noted that while several states such as Maharashtra, Kerala and Telangana have laws to deal with violence against doctors, they do not address deficiencies in institutional safety standards.
Well, Manipur state also does not have a law to deal with violence against doctors and the government has had to deal with such violent incidents on a case-to-case basis. The task force has been asked to submit an interim report within three weeks and a final report within two months. The panel comprises R Sarin, the Surgeon Vice Admiral of the Indian Navy, Dr D Nageshwar Reddy, Dr M Shreenivas, Dr Pratima Murty, Dr Goverdhan Dutt Puri, Dr Saumitra Rawat, Professor Anita Saxena, Professor Pallavi Sapre and Dr Padma Srivastava. The bench identified several problems faced by medical professionals including lack of adequate rooms to rest, and separate duty rooms for women and men. The bench said that interns, residents and senior residents are made to do 36-hour shifts where basic conditions of hygiene and sanitation are often absent.
Well, there is a general law to deal with sexual harassment in workplaces and it also governs the hospitals and clinics also. It is also a fact, many instances of sexual harassment at hospitals and clinics of the doctors and nurses by senior members of the profession had taken place although most of them had gone unreported out of fear of reprisal. This lack of reportage is also one of the basic causes of increasing trend in continued sexual harassment. To say, Manipur does have such cases in its hospitals, health centres and clinics would be like deceiving ourselves.
In Manipur like elsewhere, the ratio of male and female doctors is almost equal while the ratio among other medical professionals like nurses and paramedical staff is dominated by the female professionals. Yet, the dominant male factor is always there like in all patriarchal societies. But today, we want to talk about the violence against doctors and other medical professionals in hospitals, health centres and clinics. There have been several incidents of doctors being heckled and harassed by patient parties in our hospitals which often result in doctors and nurses going on cease work strike.
And the casualty here is the lack of medical services by the general population who visit the hospitals for treatment. So far, such incidents had been dealt with by hospital authorities and the government on a case to case basis and never in a holistic way. Why do these incidents of patient party attacking doctors happen? It happens when the patient dies and the relatives perceive the cause to be negligence on the part of the attending doctors or specialists.
A common refrain would be of doctors and specialists giving more importance to private hospitals where they work to earn extra money and slighting the patients in the government run or public hospitals. There are also several reports of specialists paying more attention to patients who visit them at their homes and the private hospitals they work. But this is not the case with all doctors or specialists. Some of them stick firmly to their ethical standards and treat all patients like a good doctor should. And we must say, the time has come for the state to institute a mechanism to deal with unhealthy situations with regard to the work and ethics of doctors and all medical professionals.
