Punjab Health Minister Dr. Balbir Singh on Wednesday suspended 3 Medical Officers of Jalandhar Civil Hospital and dismissed 1 House Surgeon from services. Dr. Balbir Singh's action comes after a team from Chandigarh visited Jalandhar Civil Hospital to investigate the deaths of three patients due to oxygen supply disruption.
At first, Jalandhar Civil Hospital's SMO and other Doctors claimed that the deaths of patients in ICU were not due to oxygen supply cut. The doctors had claimed that all the said patients died at different timings and pressure of oxygen was reduced and it did not impact the patients.
However, Health Minister Balbir had visited the hospital mid night and announced an investigation by a team of Chandigarh.
Addressing a press conference on Wednesday, Health Minister Balbir Singh announced that three medical officers including Medical Superintendent (MS), SMO and Consultant Anesthesia have been suspended with immediate effect.
On the other hand, House Surgeon has been dismissed from his services. Continue reading below to know what did Dr. Balbir said-
"A very unfortunate incident took place at Jalandhar Civil Hospital. Multiple critically-sick patients died due to temporary disruption of oxygen supply due to low pressure. We could not save the life of those patients. CM Bhagwant Mann and National Convener Arvind Kejriwal have always given priority to health infrastructure.
The government never said no for funds linked to health infrastructure. There is no lack of facility in terms of patients safety. All kinds of medical equipment are there."
"The only thing that has lacked is the Administrator at the hospital- be it Medical Superintendent (MS), SMO, House Surgeon who was Doctor on Duty. A big negligence has been found on their part. Deficiency in service, irresponsible behaviour of their led to the incident.
"Let me tell you, Jalandhar Civil Hospital has four sources of oxygen including liquid oxygen. It was only due to lack of management work that oxygen supply was disrupted. You will all be shocked to know that they have a total of 49 medical interns, 40 Post Graduate students, 14 house surgeons, 17 medical officers, etc. It means, there are so many doctors that there are 4 doctors per bed," said Dr. Balbir.
"A team was constituted that visited Jalandhar Civil Hospital and inspected whether any negligence was done or not. Four individuals- Civil Surgeon who is Deputy Director ranked Doctor, Senior Medical Officer (SMO), the third is Consultant Anesthesia. Dr. Raj Kumar (MS), Dr. Surjit Singh (SMO), and Dr. Sonakshi (Consultant Anesthesia). Gross negligence of all these 4 doctors were found. They were on-duty in the ICU at that day. They have been suspended with immediate effect," added Dr. Balbir.
Punjab Health Minister further said, "A detailed enquiry will take place against them, they will be questioned as well. They are likely to be dismissed from service. They will also lose all their benefits that they get. Many of them have 25-30 years of experience. Dr. Sivender Singh is a House Surgeon and we are dismissing him from duty with immediate effect. The rest 3 of them will have to face inquiry. They can be dismissed from the service based on the findings."