Indian Express 19.11.2009
Shut mortuaries at 2 city hospitals add to post-mortem troubles of bereaved
The mortuaries at BYL Nair Hospital in Mumbai Central and Lokmanya Tilak Municipal General Hospital at Sion have been shut — the former for over two-and-a-half months now and the latter for the last 15 days. Both the hospitals are transferring bodies to other hospitals in the city, causing inconvenience to the relatives of the deceased.
On October 31, the cooling system of Sion Hospital’s morgue collapsed, following which the dead bodies at the morgue had to be relocated. “Of the 42 bodies, 32 had to be transferred immediately to various hospitals as they were decomposing,” said an attendant at the hospital’s mortuary.
Bodies are now being sent to R N Cooper Hospital in Andheri, Bhabha Hospital in Bandra and to Rajawadi Hospital in Ghatkopar for post-mortem. “Relatives of the dead are getting aggressive as there is a delay in conducting post-mortem. Patients who died at Sion Hospital and require autopsy, their bodies are being sent to other hospitals. Their relatives are running from one place to other,” said a source at the hospital.
“It takes a lot of time in arranging a vehicle. Also, the forensic doctor from Sion Hospital will go to other hospitals for post-mortem which is time consuming,” said the attendant.
Apparently, the mortuary at Sion Hospital, next to the CT scan centre, was meant to be a temporary one for two years after the old mortuary was demolished. But, it continues to operate from that makeshift location for over a decade now. “For over 12 years, the post-mortem centre is functioning in a makeshift area without any renovations. The department is completely neglected,” said the source.
However, the hospital’s dean denied that the mortuary and the post-mortem room is a makeshift one. “It was only recently renovated,” said Dr Sandhya Kamat, Dean, Sion Hospital. “There is some technical fault in air-conditioning at the morgue, so we have asked to shift the bodies and have made alternate arrangements. The mortuary will be functional in a few days,” Dr Kamat said. The state-of-the-art forensic medicine complex at Sion Hospital that had to start by 2005 is still under construction. “By next year, the complex will be functional,” Dr Kamat said.
Meanwhile, for over two-and-a-half months, Nair Hospital has been sending bodies to JJ Hospital for storage as the newly-fitted cold storage boxes were found to be substandard. “We are not accepting unclaimed bodies as there is no space to keep them. All the bodies are transferred to JJ Hospital for storage. However, autopsies of claimed bodies are conducted at Nair Hospital,” said a source at Nair Hospital.
“The morgue had a capacity of 24 boxes for bodies. Eight new boxes were introduced, but they were substandard. Presently, only eight boxes are working but are not in good condition,” said the source.
