TEAM HERALD
teamherald@herald-goa.com
PANJIM: Is the Goa Medical College and Hospital, sitting on a ticking time bomb? The answer is yes, if the response given by M/s Scoop Industries Pvt Ltd (SIPL), in response to a query from the hospital management is to be believed.
According to the medical gas supplier, inflammable gases such as oxygen have been leaking from the piping system at the Goa Medical College.
The response of the GMC management to this major lapse appears as casual, to say the least. When questioned, the GMC Dean, Dr V N Jindal replied, “The company (British Oxygen, which had installed the piping) stopped operations in India and there was no way we could replace the joints. It was only after they replace the old piping that we could stem the leaks.”
While admitting that gases were indeed leaking, what was alarming was the response of the Dean to the possibility of fire. He tried to explain why such potentially lethal gases were allowed to leak with no action being taken, “Besides, these are ICU wards and nobody is going to light a match in an ICU.” Experts with technological knowledge say that oxygen is highly inflammable and if this is true it could make the ICU wards a ticking time bomb.
In the reply seeking to explain why they had supplied twice the number of cylinders of medical gases to GMC, Sanjeev Naik, Managing Director of SIPL had given several reasons one of which was that there was gas leakage at the Goa Medical College.
“We further like to inform that there are more leakages at wards, operation theatres in old block which are looked (after) by PWD through their contractor and we are not allowed to handle these repairs. Also there are un-operated outlet points which are due for repairs by PWD in the old block. Due to this fact the sisters from wards at the old block insist with us at random to provide loose cylinders with accessories like manometers, humidifiers, flow meters vacuum jars, flexible pipes, etc,” the letter to hospital authorities reads.
Other reasons offered by the company include that of testing the piping inauguration of new blocks, as well as addition of new beds, thus increasing the number of patients in the wards, all of which genuinely requires an increased consumption of medical gases.
“It is true that there are new beds added and the consumption of gases will gradually go up as repairs are complete and new beds added and block inaugurated. But can it explain a doubling of supply the very next month after the new supplier takes over and continues to remain at that height for the entire period that it has been supplying?” a source from within GMC asked.
SIPL has claimed it has taken “immediate steps to stop the leakage wherever possible and repaired many ‘outlets’ of medical gases” yet the supply of gas has not decreased for around two years after SIPL started supplying.
It may be recalled that Herald had reported how the supply of medical gases to the hospital increased soon after a new company, SIPL, won the tender of supplying medical gases, resulting in almost doubling the financial burden on GMC’s budget.