Holding onto queue barricades, leaning against walls, crouched on the floor or simply standing and fidgeting... The sight of women in different stages of pregnancy waiting in queue for hours at the outpatient department of Area Hospital, Nampally is distressing, no less.
The queue starts a few steps after the hospital main gate and extends till the outpatient consultation corridor on the ground floor. Some of the women were nestled closely on steps leading to the corridor. The only relief for them is the shade of a tree near the entrance and another around the corner of the building. A few chairs are placed inside the corridor, but those are barely enough.
“I reached here at 10 a.m., and have been standing in the queue for almost two hours,” said a four months pregnant woman standing a few feet from the steps. Behind her was another woman, in her eighth month of pregnancy, sitting on the ground. “I have been coming here since the past few months. The waiting time is always long,” she said.
Hospital superintendent P. Sunitha said the long wait is a temporary issue and that they are going to take up renovation of the outpatient section in a few days.
Footfall at the Area Hospital has picked up as midwives services are also provided there, apart from consultation and treatment by obstetricians and gynecologists. Some of the patients opined that the waiting time can be reduced if the outpatient section is given additional staff.
Since monsoon is expected to arrive in a couple of weeks, lack of sufficient resources and roof over the queue lines may cause further discomfort to the expectant mothers.
