Healing, then waiting: When three months became 15 years

In an unlikely turn of events, a treatment that should have lasted no more than three months for two destitute patients at King George's Medical University extended into stays of 12 and 15 years.

- Sreya Deb

LUCKNOW:

On January 9, after more than a decade of delays in legal proceedings, these patients from the female ward of the psychiatry department were finally relocated to a homeless shelter.

Patients Sonia, 38, and Astam, 48, admitted to KGMU in 2009 and 2014, respectively, were being treated for psychosis and mental retardation in the Psychiatry ward for 15 and 12 years, respectively, due to what the hospital has called "delays in legal proceedings" for placing them in shelter homes.

At a government hospital where patients often vie for beds to free up, in some cases, the hospital ward has become a permanent home for patients such as these.

However, two others remain to be relocated, having completed 13 and 14 years as patients at KGMU.

"These patients have been in the ward since before I took charge of the department," said Dr Vivek Kumar, head of the psychiatry department, who took charge in 2021. "Many of the senior nurses have cared for these patients for years on end."