Dr. Maneck Bhagat: Pioneering Pediatrician, Teacher, Musician
Individuals, Medicine
Dr. Maneck Bhagat: Pioneering Pediatrician, Teacher, Musician (1917 – 1982)
7:30 am sharp, Pediatrics Ward 2, at the King Edward Memorial (K.E.M.) hospital, Bombay: in came Dr. Maneck Bhagat, dressed informally in his plain shirts and pants. First stop: the ward toilets. Were they scrubbed clean? If not, there was hell to pay. The orderlies had to appear pronto and scour those bathrooms spotless. Then, one by one, the nurses brought in the newly admitted children for Dr. Bhagat to examine with his pediatric residents and medical students gathered around. “The nurses had to be meticulous with the kids’ cleanliness. The nails had to be scrubbed clean,” said one of Dr. Bhagat’s former residents, as life-threatening gastrointestinal infections were rampant among the vastly overcrowded slum communities from which the patients in his K.E.M. ward came.
