Critical Condition: The Fading Heartbeat of Healthcare in Rural Karnataka
- Anugrah Reghu
- Mar 16
- 4 min read
Updated: Mar 18
In the dimly lit corridors of Kaiga Generating Station(KGS) Hospital, faint shadows of patients waiting dance against the peeling paint of the walls. Larger than these however is the shadow cast by the shortage of doctors over this institution. Whispers of understaffed medical teams greet patients as they navigate the many ways of the hospital which take them to a few doctors. This critical void has unfortunately become the norm of the heartbeat of healthcare in this village.
The hospital stretches in length to about half a kilometre. The patients who visit this hospital would not feel that as they enter the building. Barely half of the building remains functional today. One such patient was Kamala. A resident of Kaiga Township, this is her only option for healthcare in the nearest one hour. She is among 300 others who live in this part of the Western Ghats. “The healthcare here is free for employees. This is our only practical choice. I usually come hoping for a reference to Manipal”, Kamala remarks with resignation. She has brought up the issue of shortage of staff with the administration multiple times but never has it helped.
Kamala had come that day to get a reference to Manipal Hospital, Udupi. She had a minor surgery that had to be done in a week but KGS Hospital did not have the staff and facilities to do the operation. The mostly silent atmosphere of the hospital keeps giving her a sense of desolation. This sense of desolation has been also felt by newer residents of this township who come here as part of their profession. An online review by Subhadeep Sen which was given about a year ago states “Mediocre doctors, doing only clerical jobs like referring to other hospitals, infrastructures are underutilised, lethargic nurses.”
The KGS hospital was built in the 1980s as part of the Residence Colony for workers of the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited(NPCIL) Power Plant built nearby. The hospital lies around an hour away from the nearest city, Karwar. Karwar is the Taluk headquarters of the Uttara Kannada district and is much better equipped medically - personnel and infrastructure-wise. With the average age lying between 40 and 50, most of the doctors who work here in KGS hospital had worked earlier in other colonies of NPCIL residents. Many such doctors here admitted that they were not here of their own will but were transferred forcefully.
India has been facing the issue of doctor shortage ever since its population surge. The Economic Times highlighted this issue in a recent article citing data from the WHO which showed that in 2020, there were 0.7 doctors per 1000 patients when the recommended level is 1.0.
The hospital remains open 24 hours a day and has two emergency ambulances at all times to transport patients to other hospitals. On average, it has about 4 doctors on duty even though the capacity is for 20 at a time. KGS hospital was exclusive to the employees of NPCIL for most of its existence as it was made for that specific population by the Department of Atomic Energy. It was only recently that the hospital opened its doors to the wider public as part of the corporation’s Corporate Social Responsibility and accepted patients from adjacent villages. As part of the CSR, the hospital also funds nearby health centres through the DAE.
The hospital had faced backlash earlier for allegedly misdiagnosing a patient and prescribing her the wrong medicine which ended up worsening her condition. When asked about this, the patient: Sai says that once she had visited the hospital due to chest congestion. She was prescribed cough syrup and antibiotics which were generic drugs and she was told that this would reduce the pain. No tests were conducted on her and she was advised to take rest. Her pain grew worse over the week and she ended up visiting a general clinic in Karwar.
The clinic was run by a doctor called Hegde who was well renowned in the city. He prescribed her two injections and nebulisation after which her pain reduced massively. He explained to her that the drugs she was prescribed earlier only worsened her pain because they solidified the mucus which caused it in the first place.
It was only later from an X-ray and a detailed blood test from Manipal Hospital-Udupi that she knew that she was suffering from allergic bronchitis and not a chest infection. Even the cleaning staff remark on the frequency of these events and how change is yet to come here.
The Karnataka High Court took notice of the shortage of medical staff in the state and initiated a PIL of its own. A significant figure they took into consideration was that there was a staggering shortage of 723 MBBS doctors and 7,492 nurses in the state. As India’s population rises at a rapid rate, the medical infrastructure required for it is struggling to keep pace. The issue is felt manifold in rural areas and unless the State and Central Government allot resources to fix it, stories like those of Kamala and Sai will remain the norm.
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