Dr. S.P. Kalantri

Dr. S. P. Kalantri is a physician, teacher, and researcher who has spent over four decades practicing medicine in rural India. He is currently Professor of Medicine at the Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences (MGIMS), Sevagram. Through his memoir “Stetho in Sevagram,” he reflects on a lifetime of clinical practice, teaching, and the ethical challenges of delivering care in resource-limited settings. His work explores the intersection of medicine, society, and the everyday realities of patients and doctors in rural India. He has a longstanding interest in evidence-based medicine, medical ethics, and the social determinants of health, and has contributed extensively to clinical research and medical education.

Finally! Evidence enters Covid national guidelines

I couldn’t believe my eyes. So I asked my colleague to read to me the recent COVID-19 guidelines from the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), in the Union health ministry. I couldn’t believe my ears either. The nine-page PDF document talks about how to treat, investigate and monitor patients with a COVID-19 infection. What are the … Read more

Remdesivir: Much ado about nothing?

Remdesivir. Hydroxychloroquine apart, no drug during the current pandemic created as much controversy, generated as much hope, led to as much black marketing and eniced as many physicians and people as Remdesivir did. I was not sure if remdesivir indeed reduced the chances of dying in hospitalised patients and wondered if the hype and hope … Read more

Covid and Sevagram

Exactly a year ago, on this very date, a 64-year-old person arrived in the repurposed Covid block of Sevagram. He hailed from Washim—a town 225 km south-west of Sevagram—tested positive in the neighbouring medical school and was admitted to what was once a Medicine ICU. He was the first patient in our Covid ICU, the … Read more

The black fungus

Beginning May 2020, we admitted hundreds of patients with COVID. But in the middle of last month, something changed. Patients arrived with problems we had not yet seen in the pandemic: people were not only breathless and feverish but also had pain and pressure behind their cheekbones and around their eyes. Some lost their vision. … Read more

When Covid goes to the villages

Rural India. A third of our population lives in rural India. The COVID-19 pandemic has now entered rural parts of our country and these areas are now carrying twice as much as disease burden as the urban and semi-urban areas. The hospitals in our cities are towns are overloaded and overwhelmed. Our rural infrastructure is … Read more