KARACHI, April 8: The appointment of 396 doctors and paramedics for the Karachi Institute of Heart Diseases (KIHD) has once again been delayed by the city government due to some unspecified reasons. City government sources said that a summary in this regard had been sent to City Nazim Syed Mustafa Kamal about one month back, but no decision had been taken as yet.

In February, Chief Minister Dr Arbab Ghulam Rahim had approved the SNE viz-a-viz the new vacancies as demanded by social and medical circles.

According to sources, the KIHD governing body, in pursuance of the federal government’s policy, had recommended to the city government to recruit employees in grade-16 and above through the Public Service Commission (PSC) to ensure selection of only competent professionals.

However, the sources claimed, the city government intended to appoint doctors and paramedics on contract basis directly. The city government has already started the process of recruitment process under which 80 posts of grade-16, 17 and 18 at the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital were being filled on contract basis without requiring the candidates to clear the PSC examinations.

The KIHD, the second major cardiac hospital in public sector, was built by the previous city government headed by Niamatullah Khan in the premises of the Karachi Medical and Dental College building in 2005.

However, the hospital could not start functioning as per the schedule as the provincial government had not approved the SNE despite repeated requests made by the then city nazim Niamatullah Khan.

Eventually, the city government had withdrawn two specialists, four doctors and 30 paramedics from different hospitals and transferred them to the KIHD to run the OPD, sources said.

Currently, the hospital is providing OPD, angiography and angioplasty facilities. Its emergency ward and critical care unit are not functioning for want of staff.

Being the second biggest hospital for cardiac diseases in the city after the National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases (NICVD), the KIHD is supposed to serve mainly the residents of F B Area, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Gulberg, New Karachi, North Nazimabad, SITE, Orangi, Baldia, Gadap and Jamshed towns who would avail the emergency care closer to their locality than the NICVD.—Online