PESHAWAR: Taking notice of the frequent protests and strikes by the doctor community, Health Minister Shahram Tarakai on Tuesday directed the authorities of Medical and Teaching Institutions (MTIs) to take immediate measures in consultations with the Board of Governors (BoGs) to ensure uninterrupted services to indoor and outdoor patients.
The health minister was already disturbed with frequent protest demonstrations and suspension of services by the doctors but the latest pressure came from ongoing protest by the Young Doctors Association (YDA) at the Ayub Teaching Hospital (ATH) in Abbottabad.
The young doctors, representing house officers (HOs) and trainee medical officers (TMOs), have been on strike and have suspended all types of services at the ATH for more than a week. These doctors first paralysed health services at the three tertiary care hospitals of Peshawar, including Lady Reading Hospital (LRH), Khyber Teaching Hospital (KTH) and Hayatabad Medical Complex (HMC) in Peshawar and Ayub Teaching Hospital ( KTH) in Abbottabad and then started a hunger strike in Peshawar.
Their strike didn’t stop at ATH and thus all services at the outpatient departments (OPDs) are suspended. Interestingly, the doctors have not been able to attend OPDs due to so-called strike but all of them are seen at their private clinics.
Most of the faculty members in ATH held the Board of Governors (BoG) and particularly its chairman Javed Panni responsible for the all management issues in the hospital.“The BoG and its chairman are primarily responsible for what’s going on in ATH. The chairman has never been serious and sincere with the task he was assigned,” said the faculty member on condition of anonymity.
When reached on phone, chairman BoG Javed ?Panni avoided making any comment.The faculty members always complain that the BOG meeting held in Islamabad Club could not make any progress in gynae, paediatrics building college of dentistry, casualty renovation and other civil projects despite of all incomplete works, contracts for more civil projects are awarded. The sources said that chairman BoG has set up his camp office in Islamabad and has put extra financial burden on the hospital.
They complained that record the meeting was not maintained in black and white.Meanwhile, Shahram Tarakai has directed the BoG to immediately take measures by engaging the protesting doctors through dialogue. “In case if they fail to comply requisite punitive measures may be taken to restore services in the hospitals,” the minister said in a statement issued on Tuesday.
He said the government has gone out of the way administratively and financially solving countless issues of the doctors.Shahram Tarakai directed the relevant authorities that all measures should be taken and patients should be provided uninterrupted services in all the public sector hospitals.