Now, Uttarakhand’s Doon hospital faces staff crunch; employees switching to private specialities

New Delhi: Dehradun’s Doon Hospital is in the limelight again but not for good reasons. The state-run hospital has lately been in news for creaking infrastructure & poor medical services. The hospital is now beset with a fresh crisis – staff crunch, as many of its employees are making a switch to private hospitals for better working conditions & handsome emoluments.

People working as nursing staff at the Doon hospital are leaving and opting for jobs in other hospitals. This has led to a staff crisis in the government-run hospital and patients are facing lot of inconvenience.

A large number of nursing personnel were recruited in Doon Hospital some time ago, during the COVID period. They were also called ‘Corona Warriors’ and assisted patients affected by Coronavirus. but as soon as the COVID infection subsided, all the personnel were relieved by the hospital. This led to nursing workers being forced to protest on the streets.

Even now, nursing personnel are being given appointments on temporary posts in the hospital, due to which the nursing staff faces the danger of losing their jobs at any time. That is why they are looking for jobs in other hospitals.

As compared to Doon Hospital, private hospitals are providing better facilities and better salaries to their employees. The nursing staff of Doon Hospital is not ready to work for low wages, due to which they are ‘migrating’ to private hospitals.

Located at Race Course in Dehradun, the hospital presents a sorry state of government hospitals and ‘Corona Warriors’, who were lauded by the Centre and state governments are now suffering with temporary jobs and low wages.

Supritendant of the hospital, Y Rizvi, said that there is a shortage of nurses across the country as the administration focuses on hiring doctors, while the paramedical staff is as important. He added that the number of regular nurses in Uttarakhand is short as they are hired for a specific time period. While the government time-to-time increases their periods but a permanent solution is to have more regular nursing staff.