Nurse in eye of storm as patient dies in Salem GMKMCH
SALEM: A video of a nurse, purportedly downplaying the death of a
patient under her watch, went viral on social media, sending top
officials at the Government Mohan Kumaramangalam Medical College
Hospital (GMKMCH) in Salem into an overdrive to contain the damage, here
on Tuesday.
Soon after outrage started pouring in,
GMKMCH dean Kanagaraj ordered a probe to find out if the death was due
to the nurse’s negligence.
According to sources, Chandran (38), a
painter from Shevapet in Salem, was referred to the GMKMCH from the
government Hosur hospital on Saturday after he sustained grievous
injuries in a fall off a building on Friday.
Chandran was admitted to the trauma ward
at GMKMCH in the early hours of Saturday. However, he was shifted to
the septic ward on Sunday as there was no friend or relative attending
on him. Later in the day, Chandran’s relative called on him at the
hospital, only to find him lying dead on his bed.
When they alerted the duty nurse, she
came to the ward and did not touch the body to ascertain if Chandran had
passed away. A few relatives recorded the exchange of words on their
mobile phones and circulated it on social media like Whatsapp and
Facebook.
In the video, relatives of Chandran ask
the nurse to check whether the patient was dead. The nurse comes near
Chandran and does not touch him. When relatives question her, she
retorts she has to take care of eight wards and might not have checked
on Chandran.
Meanwhile, GMKMCH doctors defended the
nurse, blaming the deceased’s relatives for not accompanying him.
“During nights, nurses monitor all the patients.
If there is someone with a patient, they
can alert them in case of emergency,” they said. Speaking to Express,
Dean Kanagaraj said preliminary inquiries revealed that the nurse was in
charge of two wards, not eight as claimed in video.
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