I lived in India for well over 5 years, and I have to say that Doctors are given too much power - which is a frightening thought when that power is in the hands of an incompetent fool.
Many times I have been asked by my friends to perform simple nursing tasks such as IM/IC/IV injections... all because the idiots masquerading as Nurses/Lab Tecs are incapable of safely completing the task.
They also cause so much physical and emotional pain in doing so, that the patient is scared everytime it comes round to the time for that ’dreaded injection’! It shouldn’t be like this...
While working in an Indian hospital, I was astonished at the lack of basic knowledge the nurses displayed. Basic questions regarding organ systems, heart structure and conductivity, muscles (types and function) etc etc etc... things I learnt and given a detailed 1 hour written examination on in my first 3 months of training back in 2001.
Yes, they can whip a Venflon in without much problem, but that won’t be of much use to a patient when he/she arrests, or when he/she starts to go into renal failure - if you can’t spot the signs, how can you hope to prevent?
As one Indian doctor himself commented to me one day, ’Unfortunately we are treated like Gods, and that position in misunderstood and misused by ourselves, the doctors. We think too highly of ourselves, and all too often we are not willing to take into consideration the patient’s fears or views - this needs to stop!’
I have worked in an Indian hospital as part of my Nurse Training (I am now entering my 3rd Year in a top London University Hospital) and I plan to work in India upon my completing the course.
However, if the doctors think for one minute that I am going to be talked down to, over-stepped in clinical and nursing decisions regarding patients under my nursing care, and expected to clean up after their mistakes, they have another thing coming!
Patients deserve to be listened to - after all, it’s their body, their life and their money. Nurses should empower patients to make those decisions by furnishing them with the correct and timely information needed to safely do so, and not keep them in the dark about care and treatment.
Also, treatment should not be given on the basis of how much you have paid - I remember my brother-in-law’s operation in a so-called top hospital in Orissa; halfway through the operation they asked me to go and purchase a Size 14 Chest Drain...! Not only were they not prepared pre-operatively, the Pharmacy didn’t have one in 14... so I had to get a size down (12)! Unbelievable! I ended up giving him his injections because they a) reused the needle and b) caused so much pain and tissue damage that he refused to let them near him.
Bad nursing care is something no-one should suffer... regardless of your social/monetary status.
I was thinking to work at Apollo Hospital, but after reading about the reputation it seems to be building for itself, I think they will be absent from my list of hospitals to apply to...!
All I can do is convey my regrets and sympathy to the people who have conveyed their sufferings at the hands of Apollo on this site, and I wish you all the best of luck and Sri Krsna’s blessings for the future.
Hare Krsna