Doctors protest attack on colleague

An infuriated daughter of a recently deceased patient attacked a doctor in a surgical ward.

RAWALPINDI: Young Rawalpindi doctors held a protest outside the Rawalpindi Medical College (RMC) on Monday, urging the authorities to lodge an FIR against a constable who attacked Dr Waleed Iqbal. The house officer was attacked  by Constable Hidayatullah in surgical ward- II of Holy Family Hospital Rawalpindi  on October 22.

At that time, Hidayat was an attendent of a 55-year-old terminally ill woman named Musarat Bibi, who was admitted to the hospital over two and half months prior to the incident. Musarat passed away on October 22. When Dr Iqbal told Hidayat about the death, the constable allegedly became aggressive and attacked the doctor.

Hidyat accused the doctor of negligence and said that he had not given proper attention because of which the patient had died. Iqbal took refuge in the intensive care unit while security guards removed the constable from the hospital premises.

When the doctor returned to the surgical ward, he felt something hard hitting him on the head. “The deceased Musarat’s daughter hit me on the head with a cup; I started bleeding and later needed three stitches, ” said Dr Iqbal.

The doctor has decided not to press charges against the daughter following an apology. “But the security of doctors has become a major issue, ” he added.

Raja Sahiq Sarwar, spokesman of Holy Family Hospital said, “The hospital administration has formally asked New Town police to take action against the accused.”

In light of the incident, the Young Doctors Association (YDA) of Rawalpindi Hospitals which includes House Officers (HOs), Postgraduate Trainees (PGTs) and Medical Officers (MOs) working at the Allied Hospitals (AHs) went on strike to hold a protest on Monday.

The demonstration outside RMC New Teaching Block was later called off and doctors said they would wait seven days for follow up action. If nothing was done, they would go on strike again.

“Our aim was to give the silent hospital administration a wake-up call regarding the security of medical staff, ” said Dr Usman Malk, a senior member of YDA.

They were holding placards reading: ‘Stop torturing doctors’, ‘We condemn the criminal silence of authorities concerned’, and ‘We Want Justice’.

They also demanded of the Punjab government to increase their salaries and reduce their working hours.

Talking to The Express Tribune, principal of RMC Dr Afzal Farooqi said that after the protest, administration would be deputing more security guards to protect doctors.

He said that action was not taken earlier as the matter had been settled between the two parties. Farooqi said security was not the primary issue behind such incidents. He explained that since it was a community-based hospital, accessible to all sorts of people, it was difficult to police. Dr Sidra Bano, house officer at the gynaecology ward, said that no security guards were available outside her ward after hours.

“Due to this, male attendants get inside the labour room and harass the female staff, ” she added.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 26^th, 2010.