[Reader-list] April posting.

[manju singh bhati]

Government Hospital se!

These days I have been visiting a government hospitals.Quiet often i 
sit on the row of the benches in OPD meant for pregnant women.The 
most fascinating thing i saw during these visits was exclusive range 
of colours of their lipsticks.I have never seen those shades anywhere 
else.These shades may be a hinderance for attending doctors to 
diagnose if the patient was anaemic or not but for me theye were 
quiet interesting.
    Another thing i noticed was the large number of teenagers sitting 
in the queue for their turn.Kaushalya Devi was unsuccesfully trying 
get pregnant for the last 6 years.It is interesting to note that her 
age is just 19 and that she got married at the age of 13.Only thing 
she knew was that pregnancy follows marriage.She did not have an iota 
of an idea about puberty and birth control.And she was not an 
isolated case there.
   Gulnar,19 had given birth to a girl two days before I met her.This 
was her second child and that too within two years of 
marriage.Needless to say that she was very weak and needed blood but 
not even her husband was willing.Her own opinion was that in the case 
of she giving birth to male child,things would have been better for 
her.There several other similar cases where even family members had 
refused to donate blood to the suffering woman.
   In the labour ward I met expecting mothers who were very much sure 
about the gender of their would be babies,not because they had 
undergone sex determination test but because of the kind of food they 
had taken.
   I had this idea that emotional support is needed during 
labour.Husband or a chosen member of the family should be allowed in 
the labour room,but i found out that this was just my 
opinion.Ironically most of the women had chosen Kasturba Gandhi 
Hospital because here no one was permitted to have their husbands or 
relatives by their sides.The unanimous opinion was ,"unhen ghar pe 
roj jhelte hain ,wo kya kam hai!yahan roz ki afat se to bache hue 
hain".About labour pain they said,"Ye dard bhi to usi ne diya 
hai,yahan aake kaun sa marham lagayega".All of them laughed in 
approval.