india

Updated: Apr 06, 2020 20:09 IST

For Sanjay Jaiswal the day begins with a rushed breakfast and some quick exercises. Then he sets out for the hospital, where on any given day he takes between 500-700 phone calls from those seeking medical advice and examines patients. In the wake of the Corona pandemic, and the ongoing 21-day nation-wide lockdown, restrictions have been imposed on patients seeking medical care in hospitals and other medical centres such as nursing homes.

It is here that tele-medicine has come to the rescue of doctors.

“Earlier, there was no permission for doctors to conduct consultations through tele-medicine, but now conditions have been relaxed by the MCI and we can at least see our patients online or speak to them on the phone. My wife is a gynecologist, and we have strict protocols in place to ensure there is no spread of infection in the hospital,” he said.

In between his duties as a doctor, Jaiswal, who is also the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Bihar unit chief and Lok Sabha MP from West Champaran, has to field calls from party workers, and attend daily meetings with party bosses.

But it is his Hippocratic oath that overrides all else these days. Jaiswal said, while he has volunteered to be deployed (for care of corona patients); to ensure that the other health care workers in his hospital are safe, a 140-bed isolation ward has been set up in his hospital.

“We have requisitioned for PPEs and cardiac monitors as there is a shortage all across,” he said.

Referring to the overall monitoring of Covid-19 spread in the state, which is among the most populous with severe gaps in healthcare, Jaiswal said Asha workers, ANMs and tola workers in rural areas have been empowered to monitor every resident with travel history.

“Each Asha or tola worker has been assigned 10 people who have come from outside. They check on them regularly and share the data of checking blood samples etc. Luckily, so far we have not had a single positive case,” he said.

Another doctor-turned-MP, Anil Jain, who is also the BJP general secretary, has been monitoring the situation on the ground in Haryana and Chandigarh. A consultant surgeon with the Apollo Group, Jain has not been practising medicine since he took oath as an MP, but finds time to speak to those who call for consultations.

“I hear their concerns and tell them what to watch out for and when to rush to the emergency, but I have not been practicising,” said Jain, a Rajya Sabha MP.

Jain, who also attended party meetings online, is focusing more on logistics on the ground to ensure hospitals have supplies and patients are being looked after. “We are making sure that patients who need dialysis for instance are being looked after. While the pandemic has affected regular services, we are ensuring that treatment is not stalled,” Jain said.

Former minister and now MP from Gautam Buddh Nagar, Mahesh Sharma has also returned to the examining table. As per a party aide, Sharma, who runs the Kailash hospital chain, is also examining patients at the hospital.