KARACHI: The Sarfaraz Rafiqui Shaheed (SRS) Hospital run by the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) has been doing without consultants, as a result of which no surgery has been performed in the hospital for the past six months.

Sources at the hospital said that the 100-bedded institution had been facing acute shortage of consultants.

The posts of resident medical officers, medical officers and women medical officer are lying vacant in the health facility.

The posts of consultants, including cardiologist, gynaecologist, orthopaedic surgeon, surgeon and anaesthesiologist, are vacant causing problems for patients.

No surgery could be performed in the hospital after retirement of previous anaesthesiologist.

Only 16 nurses are available in the health facility out of 26 sanctioned posts.

Presently, 15 doctors are available in the hospital as the number of outpatient department (OPD) patients has drastically declined due to unavailability of consultants, medicines and other medical facilities.

Around 70 to 100 patients visit different OPDs of the hospital every day.

Medical superintendent SRS Hospital Dr Nadeem said a formal request had been sent to the KMC for hiring consultants to improve patient care in the hospital.

He admitted that surgeries and admissions at the hospital had been halted due to lack of anaesthesiologists and surgeons.

When contacted, senior director of medical and health services, KMC, Dr Birbal Genani said several requests had been made to the Sindh local government authorities for recruitment of consultants and other medical staff to overcome the shortage of staff in the hospital, but to no avail.

Published in Dawn, June 27th, 2019