For the last four years, the Delhi government’s Guru Tegh Bahadur (GTB) hospital has been facing severe shortage of senior resident doctors. This issue has been highlighted by the top faculty members to the administration. Presently, 95 posts of senior resident doctors are vacant at the hospital that was converted into a COVID-only facility last month.

According to the Delhi government’s Corona app, 256 patients are admitted in the hospital taking treatment for COVID-19. The teachers’ association of the University College of Medical Sciences (UCMS) had already written a letter to the Vice-Chancellor of Delhi University to accelerate the recruitment procedure of the doctors working in the hospital attached with the university.

The letter to the Vice-Chancellor stated that in spite of repeated reminders in non-COVID times and previous letter during the lockdown period, they haven’t seen any progress yet. There is a shortage of doctors in UCMS and GTB hospital that has serious consequences during the COVID crisis, due to the delay.

As per the sources, since 2017, not a single faculty member or a senior resident doctor has been recruited in the medical college. This year in February, the institute had advertised for the posts for senior residents but the procedure was delayed because of the lockdown. The senior doctors said that the delay in the recruitment process will obstruct the medical services at the hospital as hospitals and their staff are now on the frontline against the COVID-19 crisis.

Dr Amir Khan Maroof, president of the UCMS teachers association said that for the last 4 years, there has been no hiring of senior doctors in the UCMS. The requirements are according to the department and the Medical Council of India (MCI) but have not been fulfilled for the past few years. Recently, the hospital has been converted into a COVID-only facility and it has become very important to fill in these vacancies. The hospital has noted the highest attrition rate with almost 40-50 faculty doctors leaving the hospital in the past 10 years.

Due to shortage of senior resident doctors, the 1st and 2nd year postgraduate medical students were deputed in the duties for COVID-19 wards. On 29th May, the Delhi government converted the hospital into a COVID-only facility with a capacity of 1,500 beds.

Dr Satendra Singh, vice-president of UCMS’s teachers’ association, said that the number of posts that are vacant for senior demonstrators and senior residents at the attached medical college of GTB Hospital in the 2017 was 59 and now it has increased to 98. Not even a single faculty member has been employed since 2017.

Dr A K Jain, principal of UCMS, also admitted the problem and said that the university is soon going to fill up these vacancies. The Government of India has changed the age eligibility for senior residents due to which there were few alterations in the process. The upper limit was 33 years initially, which is now changed to 40 years. They are waiting for approval from the DU which they are expected to receive in the coming two days. After that, they will issue a corrigendum and then the process will take another week to start.

Source: The Indian Express