Carry on Doctor!
Resident doctors are on strike.
I can't make up my mind.
On one hand, logic says that they shouldn't come back until their rightful demands are met with by the government/BMC. The mind knows that they work 12 hours a day and at least once a week, they work non-stop for 24 hours. Their job compells them to be on their feet all the time, literally. Yet they cannot afford to lose a second's alertness. They are supposed to keep thinking all the time about all the patients, remembering the past, enacting the present and planning the future. Neither the mind nor the feet can take a break. Moreover, their actions bear consequences that deal with the most precious thing in the world, life. Hence, the pressure of responsibility and competence cannot be done without. In addition to that, they have to talk and keep the relatives of the patient patient too. And after a week of dealing with them, I have a fair idea how stressed out those relatives can be who even watch over me when I collect 5ml of blood from the patient's vein and they make it a point to tell each time that they don't have enough blood and I end up explaining them that the body has 5litres of it! They panic. They have to be tackled with the mind. If you try their patience, you know what happens. And those doctors are PG students, meaning they have to study for exams. Swallow every word of tonns of fat books!
And what do they do it for? 8ooo bucks a month? Engineers of their age earn thrice that measly amount. The quarters that they live in don't comply with the living standards they have to mug up during some part of their lives. I mean, there are rats and roaches all over! And the flood water somehow always alerts these health-workers first. I ate in the RMO canteen one day and got the runs. Talk about hygiene and prevention...
Then my second personality says (c'mon, we're all crazy schizophrenics!), they do it not for the peanut-sized returns but for the gargantuan experience and knowledge they gain (potentially) by seeing so many patients. They do it because at the end of three years (potentially) they will be the best doctors they can be. If their so called jobs, weren't paying jobs but a simple studentship where they would work only as much as they wanted, even then I think they'd take up these posts and slog the way they do it under authority. Or would they?
When I can't make my mind settle down with a side, I just ask my self a question. What would I do if I was in this situation? I don't have to think twice. I'd not stop working. I choose my work and I do it because I want to work. Not for any kind of worldly recognition. Also I won't stop working because people won't stop falling sick. Even if I have to sit in the casualty to just guide someone to a private hospital in the worst pain of his/HER life, I'd do it. Because I'm human and I respect myself for being one. My respect doesn't depend on how many people I have to share my room with despite having all the skills my profession demands and all the significance my profession holds in the society.
But the government should agree with their demands. Thats the best way to bring this strike to an end. The patients and the interns are suffering after all...
The issue of applicabilty of the morality of an individual to the society and vice-versa remains unsolved in my mind but considering the fact that I have to remain in the casualty for ten hours in the night, I must now go and conserve some energy.
posted by spriha @ 4.3.06
5 comments
5 Comments:
It's a very valid point that our profession has tremendous responsibility and significance in society. We are all human beings with feelings and realize this fact. What we are seeing is probably the tip of the iceberg. Who knows? The thought of a strike may have been quashed umpteen times in the minds of the residents before they decided that there has to be a limit!
Their demands are fully justified - no one deserves to work in such conditions, and least of all a person who fulfils such a benevolent responsibility to society (especially its lower ranks).
The fault squarely lies with the administration, which disregards the needs of its employees, takes them for granted and treates them like pariahs at the time of their discontent.
I think a strike is an inappropriate way to show discontent (especially for doctors), but I also get the feeling that they had absolutely no other choice. The bottom line is that the administration needs to become sensitive to the needs of its employees.
Exactly. They have really basic demands like a fair stipend, appropriate for working hrs they spend, a decent place to live in, no beating up by ignorant relatives and a little time to sleep. How can the management expect its employees to work to their efficiency unless they r stress-free?
The ministers care a shit for the poor patients who cannot afford pvt treatment. They have their pvt hospitals afterall. And if one of their daughters goes in labour at mid-night then they don't have to come rushing to Sion hospital, only to be sent away for the only lecturer is busy delivering some other female.
The gov.'s attitude is simply ridiculous. If sum labour union goes on strike, fruitful talks end it in no more than a couple of days. Why such an uncivilized treatment to the doctors then?
But ultimately, those born in poor families as God's will, suffer.
Exactly there should be some reforms in the system and strike is the most suitable tool to handle the present conditon.
These resident docs are actually making way for all the UGs like me.
Thanks a lot. I support you.
I was asked to write about the strike and how, as interns, we are coping (or not) by the editor of a youth magazine. In choosing the title, I think having read your post (subconsiously) influenced the choice, which finally was "Carry on (Trainee) Doctor".
Thanks. :-)
Yahoo! the strike is over!!!
I can read blogs again!!
If i ever become a resident, i'll be paid more - thanks to the strike!!!
Thankg God the patients will now be managed by more competent docs rather than us brand new bumbling interns!
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