General Hospital Trivandrum

I have been hearing about General Hospital Trivandrum ever since I came to Trivandrum, and more so in last 5 years  as  ‘Ammuma’ our daily help goes to GH for all her and her family’s ailment. I hear a lot about the facilities and Doctors (And yes most of it is not so positive). Like most of the people even I had created an image of GH in my mind , crowded, shabbily maintained , long queues with not so regular availability of doctors etc. 

Now for my Driving License renewal I had to get Eye fitness certificate. Initially I thought I could get that from any Optical shop where you have Ophthalmologists to do the eye testing, but I was told that I will have to go to Eye Hospital to get that. The nearest one is Chaitanya Eye hospital. I decided to check it there. I was told 300/- for consultation as I had my Old prescription and they can get the certificate done based on that. I was in two minds, should I check out Govt. hospital? I called up Anil and he said since I had time that day why don’t I go and check GH. I was not too sure, as I had never been to GH and on my own I was not sure if I would be able to manage. But since this was just for Eye Fitness certificate I thought I will checkout.

So I had my plan ready

1.      Go to GH

2.      Find out Eye Department

3.      Give 100/- to the attendant

4.      Show my old prescription ask them to make certificate with same prescription.

5.      Pay them what they ask for (Which would come around 100/-)

GH is around 7 Km from my home, did not take me much time to reach there. I asked few people and found my way to Eye Department. The whole place is built on Kerala style architecture and its not multi storied building.Its kind of quite &calm place, lots of trees around. This also means that all the departments are different buildings scattered around, but surprisingly, clean, and decently maintained. Took me some time to find the Department  and was lucky enough to get attendants attention immediately as she was helping a child read the board and when it got over I asked her how to get the certificate.

1.      Take the token first 

2.      Come here

3.      Get the Eye tested

4.       Meet the doctor

5.      Doctor will give the certificate

I said , I just need the certificate , I already have the prescription. 

‘We have to do the eye test to give certificate’ came prompt answer.

 Ok, so I went near the entrance of the GH and stood in the line to get the token , there were about 5-7 people before me, the lady in counter was very quick in entering details, did not have to wait more than 5 mins, and the registration fees is just 2/- ! I came back to the department and it was around 12:15 already around 60 token had been called , the OP timing is till 1 PM , though there were not many people in the waiting shed, but still there were 8-9 people at doctor's cabin and eye testing area. I was called almost immediately for the reading which happened pretty quick. Had to wait for 10-15 mins when doctor called me, and when I said its for Eye Fitness certificate – She saw that my refraction reading test were not done – she scolded the sister for missing that out and making me wait for 10-15 mins when I could have got the test done, I rushed to the refraction room , I was expecting they will just do some name sake test as it was almost 10-15 mins before 1. But no they took ample time to change and test my eyes and finally gave me a prescription which had very slight power change!

Took the report ran to the doctor , just in time,  there were another 2 people in her room she finished with them (btw certificate cases are given low priority, also they look at the place you have come from , they give priority to people coming from far of places) and then looked at my report, prepared the certificate (The form I had downloaded from MVD site) When the doctor handed me the certificate I was told to give 150/- Had it not been for the certificate – I got my eyes properly tested just for 2/-and at no point did I feel that they did not do things properly because of the 2/-. 5 years back one had to pay 100/- instead of 150 /- to doctor (Anil got it done then). 

End of the whole episode, once again I was reminded not to go with any prejudices , make your own judgement .I was impressed by the efficiency of the whole team , how fast they were calling people, getting different things done, doing multi tasking , in a very humble setup, where majority of the patients come from humble background. Things might not be same in all departments, but my experience had been good – I had to spend around 3 hrs (including travel time) to get the whole thing done but I have no regrets J

PS : The GH campus is actually very nice and pleasing with lots of tress , sad that I could not find any good pictures in net :(