Three undergoing dialysis die due to outage in Puducherry hospital

Chennai, March 9 (IANS) In a tragic incident, three poor patients undergoing dialysis died due to a power cut at the Indira Gandhi Government General Hospital and Post Graduate Institute in Puducherry on Thursday, a senior official said.

"Two women, aged 55 and 75, and a man unfortunately died when they were undergoing dialysis at the hospital due to power cut. The hospital provides free dialysis treatment to poor patients," K.V. Raman, Director in the Health Department, told IANS over phone.

According to Raman, a committee has been formed to look into the issue on how the power supply was interrupted for seven minutes.

He said the generator power kicked in seven minutes after the power from the grid got cut.

"Normally, the generator power would kick in within a minute. Further, the dialysis machines would work for around 20 minutes even if the power supply gets interrupted. But here the machines did not work when the power supply got interrupted," Raman said.

He said the dialysis equipment is not old as the scheme to provide free dialysis service to the poor was launched only around one-and-a-half years back.

Raman was, however, not sure about the make of the dialysis machines.

He said the government has announced a solatium of Rs 500,000 each to the families of the dead.

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