There was an outbreak of malaria in the remote rural part of the district. With the newspapers filled with the embarrassing reports of the malaria epidemic, the District administration and the Health Department got into the action.
They formed a team of doctors from the Medical College to go the remote part of the district worst affected by the malaria epidemic to do a door to door survey of the households to identify the malaria cases, to check the water sources and pour anti-mosquito-larval medicine in any collected water to stop the breeding of malaria-spreading mosquitos.
The team with Dr. Sitaram Meena, Dr. Garry Sharma and Dr. Deepak Goyal (all Fictional Name) reached the remote part of the district. They made their headquarter at the Primary Health Centre (PHC) in the village. Only one staff nurse was posted at that village PHC. There was no doctor posted at that PHC. There were around 20 blocks in the area covered under the PHC.
Dr. Garry Sharma and Dr. Deepak Goyal decided to tackle the blocks at the two end of the area leaving Dr. Sitaram to start from the center of the area and cover as much area as possible. Dr. Garry and Dr. Deepak left on foot burdened with registers to enter the details of the malaria cases and the bottles of the anti-mosquito-larva medicines to spread in the collected pool of waters in the village.
At the end of the day, they came back exhausted, weary, hungry, as they could not get anything decent enough to eat in the field, covered with dust and mud from wading in the collected water and fields. To top it, both of them could cover only 4 blocks each. They estimated that Dr. Sitaram would have also covered four blocks, leaving the rest of the blocks still to be surveyed and tackled, which will entail staying overnight in the village and doing the same work again the next day.
To their amazement, they found that Dr. Sitaram was in the PHC before them and was looking fresh and neat as if had not set foot outside the PHC at all. Both asked Dr. Sitaram how many of the blocks had he covered.
Dr. Sitaram replied, “Don’t worry. I have covered all the remaining blocks. Here is the record all neatly entered in the register, countersigned by the Panchs (locally elected governmental body representatives).” “There is also some food left, which you are free to enjoy.”
Dr. Garry and Dr. Deepak were amazed at how Dr. Sitaram managed to cover an area double the size covered by them, get back before them and manage to look so fresh and rested.
What has happened that in the morning, after his colleagues have left, Dr. Sitaram called the ward boy (who was a middle-aged-man) and giving him some money, asked him about how long was the nurse posted at the PHC. Learning that she was posted continuously at the same PHC for last five years, Dr. Sitaram asked the ward boy that who was her patron at the village which had enabled her to stay at the PHC without getting transferred from here to there.
Dr. Sitaram knew that the nursing staffs gets frequently transferred from one PHC to another. To stay in one place some nurses make some local strong person as their Godfather. This ensures the professional and personal safety of young nurses living alone in the remote villages. The relationship may be entirely platonic. The ward boy informed him that the nurse was having a special bond with the son of the local Sarpanch (head of the locally elected governmental body representatives) who was quite attached to her.
Giving the ward boy more money, Dr. Sitaram asked him to get some food material and cook him a lavish meal, but before that call the Sarpanch’s son to meet him.
When the Sarpanch’s son came to meet him, Dr. Sitaram, took him aside and in a conspiratorial voice said, “I have some bad news for you. As you know a number of cases of malaria have been reported in this area which the media has used to embarrass the government. The Chief Medical Officer and the District Collector have taken this seriously and they have decided to transfer the nurse posted in your PHC to another district.” Seeing his crestfallen face Dr. Sitaram knew that he had hit the right target.
“But there may be way out of this situation” proposed Dr. Sitaram. “If you take the staff nurse with you, go the blocks covered under this PHC, do the malaria survey, dispense the anti-mosquito larva medicines at the collected water and get these registers filled and counter-signed by the local elected government representatives saying that the Medical team had visited the area, had done the malaria survey here and dispensed the anti-larva medications in an excellent manner then I will go and talk to higher authority that the nurse is doing an excellent job here and should not be transferred from this place.”
On hearing this the Sarpanch’s son thanked Dr. Sitaram, gathered the registers and cans of larvacidal agents, and left with the staff nurse riding behind on his Bullet motorcycle. (To be a good Godfather having a motorcycle is a must. The Godfather is able to take the nurse to remote areas for surveys and for meeting at the zonal or district headquarters on his motorcycle where public transport vehicles are not available.)
Dr. Sitaram had a lavish meal prepared by the ward boy, had a siesta after the meal, and finished his work, without leaving the PHC.
Dr. Sitaram used the relationship between the staff nurse and the Sarpanch’s son to get his work done while appearing as if he is doing a favor to the nurse and the Sarpanch’s son.
(Based on allegedly true incident)
— ND
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DISCLAIMER: This article is intended only for fun purpose. The author does not promote or recommend any behavior illustrated here or claim it to be useful. Use of the information herein is at you one's own risk. Before trying to emulate or follow anything the reader is well advised to take into account ethical, moral, legal and other considerations. The author recommends that Medical Practice should be of the highest ethical and moral level keeping in mind the interest of the patient as foremost.
DISCLAIMER: This article is intended only for fun purpose. The author does not promote or recommend any behavior illustrated here or claim it to be useful. Use of the information herein is at you one's own risk. Before trying to emulate or follow anything the reader is well advised to take into account ethical, moral, legal and other considerations. The author recommends that Medical Education should be of the highest ethical and moral level keeping in mind the interest of the patient as foremost and according to MCI and other Board’s norm.
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