Have a heart, Doc!. Review on L T M Hospital - Sion - Mumbai

First and foremost....this is NOT a review! I am not writing here any good and bad points of Sion Hospital. I am just using this forum to empty my heart. What I am going to tell you is an account of one horrible day spent in this hospital.

It was around two years ago that I was woken up by the telephone ring at 6 in the morning. As I picked up the reciever, I could make out the voice of my childhood friend Mahendra. He seemed pretty scared and somehow managed to tell me that his father was admitted at Sion Hospital and that I should immediately join him. Knowing Mahendra's nature of getting nervous exactly when conditions demand that he should stay calm, I was rushing towards Sion Hospital within a matter of minutes. When I reached there, I got some details. It seems like his father had vomitted blood and was rushed to the hospital at 5 am in the morning. I went to the doctor to enquire about the patient's condition. And yes....you guessed it! There was no doctor around. I, however, found a nurse there who told me rather rudely that the doctor would come in his own time. I tried telling the dumb sister that the patient was in urgent need of medical aid. But I guess she did not feel so!

Mahendra's father's condition was deteriorating. Even a layman could tell that he was going down by the minute. Somehow we managed to handle him for two more hours. At 9 am the interns arrived. I told Mahendra that we should talk with them. To our horror, they were not in the least bothered about the patient. ''Nothing will happen to him'', was what we heard from them.

The next hour was horrifying. Mahendra's father started shivering, and we did not know what to do about it. And can you believe this? The damn interns were having the fun of their lives just seven feet away from us. Two boys and two girls, pulling each others'legs and discussing about the latest movies in town, when a man was sinking by the minute two metres away.

Hopelessly Mahendra and his crying mother looked towards me. What could I do? I wished I was a doctor! My mind raced. And I did what first came to my mind. I started rubbing the patient's feet. That was the only thing that struck me at that moment. Somehow I HAD to generate heat in his body. Looking at me even Mahendra and his mum started doing it. We were vigorously rubbing the patient's feet and hands while the interns shamelessly joked about some college rag. I could see that our attempts were not effecting any desired results. Frantically I rushed once more to those blasted docs and appealed to their conscience to help the poor family. One of them had a wee bit amount of compassion and he asked one of the wardboys to get some medicine. The medicine was given to the patient. Still there was no proper doctor in sight. Finally, one of the interns asked us to shift the patient in some other ward. I told the doc that the patient was not in a position to do so. Luckily for me, this time the point was carried and he ordered a wardboy to get a wheelchair. Once the wheelchair was brought, he told me nonchalantly that the other ward doctor would come and see the patient. The clock showed 2.00 pm. The wardboy accompanied the wheelchair till we left the ward, and then disappeared. Mahendra was crying. Being close to his family, I was like the second son! It became my duty to take decisions. Already we had wasted lots of precious moments. I wheeled his father to the said ward, after wrapping him in four blankets and somehow we all shifted his weight from the chair to a bed. After a long wait and umpteen enquiries and umpteen arguments, finally the doctor arrived at 4 pm.

''What is the problem with the patient?'' she asked. This question should have come at 5 am in the morning. Untiringly, Mahendra started explaining her the condition of his father. By the time he finished, his father had dropped his head.

The doctor calmly declared him dead and ordered the body to be taken for the postmortem. Of course, postmortem had to be done! How else would the hospital determine that he had a natural death?

It was 4.15 pm when Mahendra's father died. Eleven hours and fifteen minutes after he was taken to L.T.M. Hospital. For eleven hours and fifteen minutes, he was in the middle of medicines and nurses and interns and doctors, awaiting some humane doctor to relieve him of his illness. For eleven hours and fifteen minutes, he was struggling with death a losing battle of survival. For eleven hours and fifteen minutes, a poor family was watching it's earning member die minute by minute while the interns were laughing and joking seven feet away.

Its been more than two years now. But whenever I pass from this hospital I cannot help remembering the face of Mahendra's father, who awaited his medication and was instead sent to the morgue.