Mumbai: BMC-run V N Desai Hospital in Santacruz East is likely to suspend in-patient services within a week or two for structural repairs, while continuing daily OPDs through three temporary porta-clinics in its compound. The move, stalled last month after opposition from local corporators, follows the hospital infrastructure committee (HIC) recommendations.The hospital’s medical superintendent, Dr Mayura Nagle, said, “We are first making all the arrangements before fixing a final date. It is likely that we will be shutting it down late next week or the week after that.”She further said electrical work remains, requiring power supply to be shut. “The decision has been taken by the BMC administration on HIC recommendations. The building is in a risky state; there are nets put up to prevent any injuries to human life,” Dr Nagle added.The hospital admits 25 to 30 patients daily with 800 to 1,000 OPD consultations across general medicine, paediatrics, obstetrics and gynaecology, orthopaedics and ophthalmology. Dr Nagle said there is space for three porta-clinics, which HIC will provide within the compound, and a handful of additional ambulances are being arranged for.Patients who require emergency admission will be sent to Bandra’s K B Bhabha Hospital — which has 436 beds — in an ambulance with a medical doctor.The staff, including nurses and doctors, will be split between V N Desai Hospital’s OPDs and Bhabha Hospital’s in-patient services. However, a senior doctor at Bhabha Hospital said it has adequate staff to manage additional patients, so sending manpower there would be counterproductive.At large, patients from Golibar and Bharat Nagar visit V N Desai Hospital for every major and minor ailment. Some of them are left feeling at sea as Bhabha Hospital would be a new facility to navigate. For instance, Nikhat Pervaiz, a pregnant woman with BP with an expected delivery date next week, said she was first advised admission today, but then doctors told her to get admitted at Bhabha Hospital. She said this would leave her dealing with new doctors and a fresh paperwork system in the final days of pregnancy.Even key support programmes at the hospital like the decade-old Dilasa clinic for domestic abuse victims are facing an uncertain future, with staff unsure if operations will be relocated or paused.
