Doctors reject long working hours

Doctors have refused to comply with the revised Out Patient Department (OPD) working hours, which were increased by two hours at public hospitals and rejected by the Young Doctors Association (YDA).

The Punjab Health Department had issued a notification in which the new closing time of OPDs was extended to 4pm from November 15.

The YDA raised a call of objection against the order, and doctors at Benazir Bhutto Hospital (BBH), Holy Family Hospital (HFH) and District Headquarters (DHQ) Hospital stopped working at their old clock-out time of 2pm.

Sources in YDA said that consultancy in OPDs is not acceptable after 2pm for them and demanded that the notification be reversed with immediate effect.

Meanwhile, BBH Medical Superintendent (MS) Dr Nawaz Khokar said that the doctors who left OPDs at 2pm were marked absent and a report has been sent to the vice-chancellor, adding that the government will decide the next course of action.

When asked for their views, OPD patients at BBH including Asad, Owais, and Sikandar said that they fully supported the new timings of the department. “An eight-hour working day is the norm for government institutions, so it makes sense to increase the timings of OPDs at public hospitals as well,” they said.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 17^th, 2021.