The Super Speciality Hospital of Jammu was started five years back to provide high tech medical facilities to Jammu city. The 240-bed SSH certainly has a speciality, and that being the absence of any ‘emergency ward’ in it. According to the Greater Kashmir, several requests have been made by the hospital administration to the government but all in vain.
A senior faculty, on condition of anonymity, member told GK
“More often than not, the critical patients are shifted by the attendants (to the Government Medical College) on their own as the Super Speciality Hospital has only one vehicle for the purpose….
….Most of the times, the patients in critical condition are shifted to the GMC, Jammu, by the attendants by managing on their own in their own vehicles or in an auto as there is only one Ambulance available with the Super Speciality Hospital”
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There is every possibility of a serious patient giving up midway while covering more than half a kilometre in a private or hired vehicle. The situation might get even more deadly for a patient if the vehicle gets stuck in a traffic jam.
The SSH has critical departments of Cardiology, CTVS, Neurology, Neurosurgery, Nephrology and Urology; any patient of one of these departments needs both, an emergency section as well as facility of swift movement to or fro from the hospital.
According to the GK, proposal for having a hundred-bedded Emergency wards at Super Speciality Hospital, Jammu, was sent to the state government repeatedly by the concerned authorities but “there was no response to that”. Former Principal GMC&H, Jammu, Dr Zahid Gillani says that apart from proposal of Emergency, a proposal for having a helipad at Super Specialty Hospital was also sent but “both were not acknowledged”.