Absent: Good medical services in Pune

While trauma cases on the Pune-Mumbai expressway have multiplied manifold, sadly, the medical services on the stretch, have remained largely neglected.

With Nigdi’s Lokmanya Hospital and Vashi’s MGM Hospital being the nearest tertiary care hospital along the expressway on both ends, injured victims are left with no choice but to visit secondary care hospitals which despite doing their best, cannot offer help to patients with serious head injuries.

Mohan Jadhav, senior police inspector at Lonavla city police station, said three hospitals along the expressway i.e. Pawana Hospital at Somatane Phata, Talegaon General Hospital and Parmar Hospital in Lonavla see maximum patients besides Nigdi’s Lokmanya Hospital.

DNA paid a visit to these three hospitals and found that none of the hospitals were equipped to treat serious accident victims with head injuries. While an ideal trauma centre according to doctors must include neurosurgeons and orthopaedics besides dedicated anaesthetists, most hospitals didn’t have them on board.

The first stop was Somatane Phata’s Pawana Hospital, a multispecialty hospital with a trauma centre but no dedicated super specialists or facilities to handle extreme head injury cases. Administrator Dr Mahesh Brahmankar admitted that it takes up to two hours at times for a neurosurgeon to reach the hospital, if a victim requires surgery.

“We have advanced diagnostic facilities like CT scan, MRI, X-Ray and have general surgeons and orthopedic surgeons too. We also have an ICU and ventilators but we don’t have cardiac surgeons or neurosurgeons and we have to call someone in emergencies. However, it could take up to two hours and sometimes, we shift patients to bigger hospitals,’’ he said.

At Talegaon General Hospital, too, the situation was similar i.e. while most secondary care services were available, the lack of super specialists was a hindrance for accident victims. What is worse is that the hospital doesn’t even have cardiac ambulances to transfer patients to a well equipped hospital. “We take only patients who require minor surgeries or with fractures. Patients, who are seriously injured, are shifted out in our simple ambulances that don’t have ventilators or cardiac monitors. If patient is too critical, we call for specialised ambulances,’’ said administrator Dr SR Chougule.

The worst situation was at Lonavla, surprisingly, the most populated area along the expressway, where hospitals lacked even senior physicians i.e. doctor of medicine (MD) degree holders. At Lonavla’s Parmar Hospital, Dr SC Parmar and his son who is a general surgeon, are handling accident cases with no MD doctors or surgeons attached to the hospital.

“We have a CT scan and ICU facilities and we carry out minor surgeries. However, we don’t have doctors with MD degrees, no intensivists to look after the ICU where paramedical staffers do the job and we don’t have orthopedic or neurosurgeons. We can only provide basic services here,’’ he said.