Srinagar: The Valley’s lone orthopaedic hospital-Bone and Joints, Barzulla is facing acute shortage of paramedics as no recruitment of para medics in this all important speciality hospital has been done since 2014.

Official sources revealed that currently the number of paramedics in the hospital is not sufficient to run the affairs at the hospital. The shortage of paramedics is subsequently affecting the patient care at the hospital, they said.

What is more concerning is that the last recruitment of paramedics was done in the year 2014, after which, as the patient rush increased, the additional man power has not been stationed at the hospital so far.

“The required number of paramedics is not in tune to what the hospital requires. The paramedics available currently are not sufficient to handle the rush of patients,” sources said.

The authorities, in order to tackle with the rush that the hospital is facing, established additional four operation theatres in the hospital, but the established theatres are lying defunct with the absence of paramedics, making the expansion a ‘mere hoax’.

“Additional theatres were established because the existing theatres were not enough to handle the patient rush, which has been increasing day by day. But all those theatres are lying defunct because there is no additional paramedical staff available to take care of these theatres,” official sources said.

Notably, B&J is the only speciality hospital in valley catering to the patients from far off areas besides patients from the Chenab Valley as well.

“The absence of basic facility of paramedics is hampering the patient care as many a times patients from Chenab Valley are referred back to Jammu for specialized treatment,” said an official, wishing not to be named.

Official sources say that if the authorities will appoint only 10 per cent of additional paramedical staff, the crisis which the hospital is facing, will eventually come down.

“There is a serious need of posting additional man power in the hospital, the additional 10 per cent of paramedics, if appointed, will help in managing the crisis,” sources informed.

The infrastructure used in establishing the additional operation theatres is turning out to be useless with the absence of man power which is required to run the theatres, sources said.

Similarly, the hospital is also lacking the man power in its laboratories that are tasked to carry out several diagnostic tests at the hospital, “test reports which are meant to take a day or two, are literally taking a full week till the reports reach to the patients, “insiders said.

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