Tags:
Journalism of Courage
PUNE, June 23: Picking up one of the million messages on the internet, web surfers with warm hearts have helped track down the Nashik-based parents of a comatose patient in far flung New York, who is lying helpless on his hospital bed, away from home and friends, awaiting further treatment.
A touching appeal on the net asking for the next-of-kin of Pravin Deshmukh, the patient at the Mary Immaculata Cardiac Care Unit in New York, was picked up by Ashish Joshi, Deputy Manager, Designs, at Thermax Ltd Energy System, Pune, this morning.
8220;The hospital would like to speak to the next-of-kin to make a major medical decision about treatment or the best course of action. If no one is available, the State of New York will make that decision,8221; the message, sent by one Pankaj Dasani, specified.
Details of the patient8217;s address in India had been picked up from his passport and mentioned the name of his parents and his address as Sindekor Sadan, Cole or Gold Colony, Old Agra Road, Nashik. 8220;If anybody either in US or in India knows anything about the patient, please call or e-mail at the given address,8221; was the appeal.
Joshi and his colleague P Srinivasan picked up the message and sent it to newspaper offices, hoping that the power of the published word would get the message across the next morning. However, they found a quicker solution within the office in the form of Pulin Damania, another colleague who had a friend in Nashik.
Damania contacted his friend in the afternoon and asked him to trace the given address. The friend visited Sindekar Sadan and met the Deshmukhs, parents of the boy in coma, only to be told that another considerate internet surfer had already passed the message to them.
While the Deshmukhs handle their troubles alone, they have already found a lot of strength and support across the world from friends on the internet.
