Chennai: In the wake of recent attacks on medicos, the state public health department is all set to deploy counsellors in government hospitals to prevent such incidents.
Effective implementation of the Hospital Protection Act will sensitise perpetrators of the dire consequences of their actions, said government sources.
According to the Director of Medical Education, R.Vimala, deploying psychologists to console distressed relatives of the deceased will terminate the issues of ill treatment of medicos.
Tensions had arisen recently in the wake of an incident in the Stanley hospital in which two people, in an inebriated condition, assaulted a doctor on duty.
Such incidents have prompted medicos to call for strict implementation of laws.
The Director of Medical Education admitted that serious discussion is on to prepare a proposal in connection with assaults of doctors.
“The perpetrator can be imprisoned to ten years according to Hospital Protection Act besides issuing compulsory compensation to the victim doctors.
The arrest in itself creates awareness and frightens others from getting into such activities,” Vimala added.
Appointing psychologists in every health care centre would lessen the incidents of assaults on doctors and accentuate the doctor-patient relationship, said members of doctors’ associations.
Suggesting more measures, member of the PG doctors association in Egmore Children hospital, G.S. Vairamuthu said CCTV cameras should be mandated in every ward of hospitals. “A police station along with permanent male security will prevent gross attacks,” he added.
Meanwhile, other doctors are frightened as they might be given the additional responsibility of counseling patients. “Doctors in government hospital already have a heavy workload. The government should appoint a professional psychologist for the purpose,” he pointed out.
