Doctors’ protest against acting VC continues at DUHS Ojha Campus

Postgraduate trainee doctors of the Dow International Medical College serving at the Dow University Hospital’s Ojha campus continued their boycott of health services on Friday.

They held a sit-in in front of the Ojha hospital and chanted slogans against the varsity’s acting vice chancellor.

Doctors said they were protesting against the “improper attitude of varsity’s acting vice chancellor Dr Masood Hameed Khan”.

They alleged that they were being overburdened and “assigned strange assignments by the hospital administration which were against rules and regulations of Pakistan Medical and Dental Council and College of Physicians and Surgeons (CPSP)”.

The doctors also alleged that when they protested against the attitude of the vice chancellor, they were asked to come with their parents to meet the VC. The protesters said it was disrespectful for them to be treated as school children.

They vowed to continue their protest if the varsity administration did not change its attitude.

“On one hand, the varsity administration is using us as consultants and senior medical officers without paying any stipends. When we protest, they ask us to bring our parents to meet the vice chancellor so that he could lodge complaints against us with them,” said a young doctor doing postgraduate training at the varsity hospital near Safoora Chowrangi.

Hundreds of patients from Gulistan-e-Jauhar, Malir, Sohrab Goth, Gadap and adjoining areas visit the Ojha campus of the DUHS for medical services but since Thursday morning, PGs have been refusing to perform their duties. They have also boycotted the services at the emergency and casualty department of the hospital.

Senior leaders of the Young Doctors Association (YDA) Sindh, including its chairman Dr Umer Sultan and president Dr Samiullah Gill, visited the Ojha campus where their colleagues had staged a sit-in inside the hospital and demanded that the VC should apologise for his attitude or quit the post immediately.

Dr Umer Sultan condemned the attitude of the acting VC and said he was blackmailing young doctors and threatening to terminate them if they didn’t bow to his illegal demands and aspirations.

“PG doctors of medicine are being assigned to work in the surgical departments, which is unacceptable for a trainee as it is not part of their training and won’t do any good to them,” he alleged and added that when doctors protested on these assignments, they were asked to bring their parents with them otherwise the acting VC would terminate their training.

The protesting doctors also alleged that acting VC Masood Hameed had also withheld their stipends for the last three months.

They showed a copy of notice to media, issued by the DUHS administration which stated that “all Postgraduate Trainees of [the] Dow International College, Ojha campus, are hereby directed to attend along with their parents a meeting with the vice chancellor” on Thursday at the Abdul Qadeer Khan Auditorium, DIMC.

But when a group of PGs gathered at the auditorium without their parents “the acting VC got infuriated, used improper language against the PGs and summoned Rangers to come to the hospital, threatening them that they would be thrown out of the hospital if they refused to follow the orders,” claimed the protesting doctors.

Samiullah Gill said PGs were being asked to perform at the Liver Transplant Unit, the Renal Transplant Unit and the ER Department which was not the responsibility of the PGs as per the PMDC and the CPSP guidelines.

“The YDA Sindh has given a three-day deadline to the DUHS administration to mend its ways or all health services at the Dow University Hospital as well as at hospitals in entire Sindh shall be boycotted,” Gill said.

He said doctors would also boycott services at OPDs and wards at the Ojha campus but would provide medical assistance in the emergency.