Nurses goof-up leaves patient in the lurch

BALASORE: For callousness of health workers, while the relatives of a deceased woman left with the body for SCB Medical College and Hospital in Cuttack, the real patient who was referred to SCB was left to suffer in hospital bed on Saturday night.The goof-up came to the fore when the police refused to accept the casualty memo without seeing the dead body. Sources said Madhumita Behera (25) of Gopinathpur village under Nilagiri police limits had died of poisoning in the hospital. Before that she was undergoing treatment in bed no. 26, another patient Subasini Das was in bed no. 27. The attending nurse, however, allegedly provided the referral memo issued in the name of Subasini to the relatives of Behera while Subasini was left to suffer. When the attending doctor Mrutyunjay Mishra sent the casualty memo to the police, they did not receive it citing that the body was missing.When the word spread, the nurse realised the mistake and called back Behera’s relatives who had already travelled 10 km towards Cuttack with the body in an ambulance.   Mishra said the nurse handed over the referral memo to the person who claimed to be the attendant of Subasini. “It is impossible to ascertain who is whose attendant,” he said besides asking the nurse to be careful henceforth.