Kolkata: The trauma care building that houses the emergency unit at RG Kar Medical College, lacks washrooms for OPD patients and relatives, even though it gets hundreds of emergency patients throughout the day. They are forced to trek down to the pay-and-use toilet located near the hospital’s main entrance.Deceased Arup Banerjee and his wife were on the first floor, waiting for their turn at the orthopaedic OT, where his son was scheduled to undergo surgery for his fractured arm. Family members said they started looking for a washroom when Ayush started crying as he wanted to go to the washroom. Unable to access the in-patient washrooms, Arup and his wife boarded the lift to descend to the ground floor. The pay-and-use toilet is around 20-ft away from the building. The emergency unit was previously located on the ground floor of the Emergency building opposite, which faced vandalism on the night of Aug 14, 2024, less than a week after a post graduate doctor was found raped and murdered on the fourth floor of the building. Since then, the unit was shifted to the trauma care building. “The previous emergency unit was well-equipped with patient facilities, including toilets. For almost two years, it has been under lock and key. This unit at the trauma care building lacks even a basic facility like a toilet. This is inhuman, and we have been pointing this out to the administration, but nothing has been done,” said an emergency medicine doctor. Junior doctors said that with many people from Banerjee’s neighbourhood rushing to the hospital on Friday, the hospital could have encountered vandalism had it not been for the presence of CISF and police personnel. The junior doctors and the Resident Doctor Association of the medical college submitted a memorandum on Friday again, demanding regular lift maintenance, audit, and proper facilities like a toilet in the building.“This incident, where a father who came for his son’s treatment meets death in the hospital elevator, is shocking. During the RG Kar movement, our demands included improving infrastructure. We hope the authorities address issues at the earliest,” said Sourav Roy, junior doctor.
