In Sattari, there is one Primary Health Center, 17 sub-health centres and two Rural Medical Dispensaries — in Thane and Guleli village.
Of the 17 sub-health centres, located in panchayat and Valpoi Municipal Council areas, most of them are non functional at present and a few closed all the time. Not a single doctor visits these sub-health centres and also medicine is not available. People, working in the sub health centres, are mostly busy with their personal work at home, and rarely come to the centres but make their presence felt only when the Health officer visits the centre for inspection, say locals.
Nine villages depend on the Dongurli Thane dispensary and on an average 100 people visit the centre daily from rural areas. But according to the locals, the doctor visits the dispensary only twice a week, leaving the patients to return for their health needs when the doctor is present.
“The doctor visits the Thane village dispensary on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We demand that the doctor comes daily to attend the patients in our dispensary,” says Tulshidas Gaonkar, a villager.
Since no doctor comes to the Guleli village rural medical dispensary, all patients are forced to go to the Ponda Primary Health Centre. “Whenever we go to the Valpoi PHC, the doctors normally advises us to go to the GMC, Bambolim, even without checking on us,” say locals.
The Community Health Centre Valpoi, which is the only primary health care for the 49,043 people of Sattari, is facing the shortage of specialist doctors. The Operation theatre, X-ray machine and Sonography have not been used for the past five years. Besides, the GSIDC and PWD are not carrying out any maintenance work, so the health centre is in a bad condition. Around 400 patients are treated here on daily basis.
The 30-bed hospital built by GSIDC is facing problems with no power backup. A huge power generator is installed but has not been used for the past many years. The state-of-the-art Operation Theatre is not yet operational due to incomplete work and non-availability of surgeons. The Air conditioning in the entire building, including casualty and observation ward, is not functional.
The Health Officer of CHC Valpoi, Dr. Gajanan Naik, said “the power generator has recently been handed over to the health centre but is not being used because the quota for diesel is not provided. He has already requested his department for the quota. “We cannot make use of the Operation Theatre, because it does not have AC. I have spoken to the higher-ups, who promised the air-conditioning will be restored soon,” Naik stated.
The Sankhali constituency has one Primary Health Centre, seven sub health centres and one rural medical dispensary in Keri village.
Doctors visit the Sankhali SBH once a week and no medicines are available at the centre, say villagers.
Only one doctor comes to the Keri Rural Medical Dispensary weekly and attends to around 70-80 patients only on Wednesday morning,” says Ramdas Shetkar, a resident.
“Every time the doctors send patients to the Goa Medical College. There is no trained staff, no proper ambulance and the X- ray machine is not functioning for the past many years,” says Shrinivas Usgaonkar a resident of Sankhali.
Only three doctors do round-the-clock duty at Bicholim PHC, 9 sub health centres and one Rural Medical Dispensary in Dodamarg.
The Health officer of the primary health centre, Bicholim, is not available for people in the afternoon. The Health officer’s duty timing is from 9 am to 4.30 pm. However, locals say that the Bicholim Health officer comes to the hospital at 10 am and leaves at 1 pm.
