Srinagar: The health department has abandoned Kashmir Nursing Home on the Gupkar Road here as no surgery or evening clinic is being run there for last five months.
According to official sources, the evening OPD facility started in 2012 by the Health and Medical Education department has been closed by the Government Medical College (GMC) Srinagar due to non-availability of doctors for conducting surgeries and evening consultations.
“The HODs of various clinical departments and senior faculty members of GMC Srinagar are unwilling to use the facility and attend government-run evening clinics at Kashmir Nursing Home despite directions by the government,” said an administrator.
He said doctors have stopped coming to the nursing home after the health department proposed to convert it into the regional ophthalmology centre following sanction by government of India in March 2019.
The evening clinics were started by the government in Srinagar and Jammu following the ban on private practice of HODs at various medical colleges. However, the initiative has failed to attract doctors as they continue to indulge in private practice.
“Only two doctors from the medical oncology see some patients occasionally while all other departments have completely abandoned the nursing home,” said a GMC official.
He said the operation theatre (OT) of the health facility was running till June as CD Hospital doctors were running the OT as a makeshift arrangement.
“Now the CD hospital has got its own operation theatre so they shifted the equipment from the nursing home. Since then the OT is defunct,” the official said.

Manzoor ul-Hassan