On Thursday, doctors at the Jallianwala Bagh Martyrs Memorial Civil Hospital, Amritsar went on a one-day strike in protest against heavy burden on them because of scarcity of emergency medical officers (EMOs) in the hospital.

Almost 80% posts of EMOs are lying vacant in the hospital and specialist doctors are forced to perform emergency duties along with their general duties.

The health services, including the outpatient department (OPD) and the emergency department, got affected for five hours as doctors and 28 specialist doctors staged a protest in the hospital building and hoisted slogans against the health department. Also, many other doctors supported their protest.

Dr Manjit Singh, a specialist doctor, said that the hospital has a total number of 10 posts of EMO. Previously, the hospital was working with four EMOs, but later the health department terminated two EMOs last week. The hospital authorities had assigned duties to the specialist doctors in the emergency ward in the absence of EMOs.

He further said that due to this assignment, they remain absent from their OPDs and hence patients suffer. The patients who are seeking treatment under Ayushman Bharat scheme are also suffering due to non-availability of specialist doctors and EMOs.

The protesting doctors have urged the health department to appoint more EMOs in the hospital and the specialist doctors can perform their general duties. Senior medical officer (SMO) Dr Arun Sharma also said that they had appealed to officials of the health department and the health minister to hire more EMOs at the hospital soon.

Source: Hindustan Times