KOTTAYAM: The post-graduate residents of Kottayam Government Medical College Hospital have refused to go on Sabarimala duty citing an acute shortage of doctors in the medicine department after mass transfers to the Idukki MCH.
The Directorate of Medical Education (DME) had posted ten senior/junior residents and one assistant professor to Sabarimala from November 15 to January 21.
The Postgraduate Residents Association sent a memorandum to the DME saying that the department had shrunk to four units from six following the transfers to Idukki. It asked the DME to first fill the vacancies in the medicine department as its functioning had been affected.
Previously, every unit had one professor and another associate or assistant professor and at least one senior resident. Two units were wound up after the transfers.
The DME had posted 44 doctors to Sabarimala from various MCHs in the state.
Dr Abel Jaison, secretary of the association, told DC that the Kottayam doctors will not go to Sabarimala. However, a doctor posted for duty said that he had received no instructions from the medicine department on the special duty.
Dr K.P. Jayakumar, the vice-principal, told DC that there is a shortage of doctors and an apprehension that if more staff goes on other duties, it may affect service in the hospital.
