All inmates admitted at Sassoon shunted back to jail

After a Yerawada Central Jail inmate escaped from the Sassoon General Hospital (SGH) while undergoing treatment, the hospital authorities have discharged all admitted inmates post treatment within a month.

All prison inmates in need of medical and surgical care are admitted to ward number 16 of the hospital. Drug dealer Lalit Anil Patil (34) managed to give the authorities at the hospital the slip on October 2 raising questions about the security measures and unnecessarily prolonged hospitalisation of inmates.

The hospital authorities on priority have provided medical attention to inmates and sent them back to Yerawada Central Jail. This is the first time in six months that the state hospital does not have a single jail inmate as patient.

Following the escape of Lalit, Dr Sanjiv Thakur, dean, BJ Medical College and Sassoon General Hospital, ordered health investigation of all admitted inmates. The jail authorities had also asked the hospital officials to provide health details of admitted inmates.

Dr Thakur, in a move to avoid unnecessary prolonged hospital stays of prison inmates, decided that treating doctors should daily evaluate their health status. A new standard operating procedure (SOP) for the prison committee of SGH was put in place.

As per the new SOP, the treating doctors should regularly evaluate the prison inmate’s health status and decide on discharge. Of the nine jail inmates undergoing treatment at the hospital till last month, it was also found that some were admitted since past several months.

Dr Thakur said that all inmates admitted at the hospital were provided the required treatment and discharged after finding them fit.

“Doctors were given stern warning to provide treatment to inmates on priority and refrain from unnecessary hospitalisation. The decision was taken to quell allegations about unnecessary hospitalisation of prison inmates,” he said.