NEW DELHI: Officials of a top hospital, in the Western Indian state of Rajasthan had to face the ignominy of protests by its own nurses and family members of a teenaged girl, who died due to its alleged negligence. Staff nurses at capital Jaipur's Sawai Man Singh hospital joined the girl's family in protesting at the hospital, who died after she did not get a bed in the Intensive Care Unit. A photo-journalist who reportedly arrived on the scene was manhandled reportedly by police personnel, who came to contain the protests. L C Sharma, the hospital's superintendent outside whose office the protests were held, left in a huff when the brouhaha continued for well over three hours. Diksha, was in the hospital's medicine ward with fever and respiratory problems, but when her condition showed no improvement, her aunt Gayatri, who is on the hospital's staff as a senior nurse attempted to get her into the ICU, where facilities are better and medical attention is more intense. Gayatri said she attempted everything to get her niece a ventilator, but the facility was not provided by the hospital authorities, despite availability. She alleged that she informed officials in the administration that three beds were available in the ICU and yet not one was allotted to her niece which is why she died. Diksha has met Rajasthan's Health Minister Dr Rajkumar Sharma and complained against the hospital authorities. Meanwhile the hospital has set up a panel to investigate the death of Diksha the medical cause of which was acute respiratory distress syndrome. Meanwhile, LC Sharma, the hospital's rules require that the requisition for a bed in the ICU must come from the patient's doctor and not family members.
