Junior doctors call off stir temporarily, set deadline for fulfilling demands

Hyderabad: Health Minister Eatala Rajender held talks with junior doctors in Gandhi and Niloufer hospitals on Thursday after which junior doctors announced they are calling off strike temporarily after assurances from minister. However if demands are not met, the PG doctors stated that they will resume strike from March 11 onwards.

 Health Minister Eatala Rajender called junior doctors for discussion in his chamber at Secretariat on Thursday evening and listen to their problems and demands. Addressing media after a long meeting, Rajender condemned attacks on doctors and warned of taking serious action against those indulging in such attacks. 

"Most of the critical cases are coming to government hospitals after private hospitals express their helplessness. But still medical teams at government hospitals are doing their best to save lives of such patients. Relatives of these patients are showing their anger towards doctors and medical staff in case of patient's death. This is not correct," he said. 

It may be mentioned here that PG doctors in Gandhi and Niloufer hospitals were abstaining from duties in wake of physical attacks by patients of relatives on duty doctors. Last week a junior doctor in Niloufer Hospital was thrashed by the patient's relative and few days ago similar incident was witnessed at Gandhi Hospital.

Doctors skipped their duties in both hospitals on Wednesday and continue their protest even on Thursday. Director of Medical Education Dr K Ramesh Reddy held talks with striking doctors on Thursday afternoon, but no breakthrough was achieved. The junior doctors presented a charter of demands including increasing security personnel, regular monitoring of security and their duties by RMO, installation and monitoring of CCTVs across the hospital, setting up a buzzer alarm etc.

After talks with DME, junior doctors stated that they would continue with their stir and plan to boycott even emergency duties in both hospitals. Later, Eatala intervened to find a solution to this problem.