Bhubaneswar, Nov 27: Demonetisation has been a double whammy for dentist Subrat Behera.

As if the cap on withdrawing money and currency note exchange were not enough, the Centre's scrapping of the currency notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 has also affected daily earnings at his clinic.

"Patients who used to regularly visit my clinic have now cancelled their appointments as they do not have sufficient new currency notes. I cannot accept the old currency notes either. Only a handful of patients are willing to pay through cheques," he said.

Behera felt that the government should have allowed private doctors to accept the old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes as well. "This would have helped not only us but also the patients," he said.

Veteran medicine specialist B.C. Mishra, who has a clinic at Saheed Nagar, said demonetisation had severely affected patient footfall at his clinic.

"Earlier, around 100 patients used to visit my clinic every day. Now, the number has come down to less than 40. My regular patients insist on paying through the demonetised notes, but I cannot accept them," he said.

Mishra, a retired paramilitary doctor, said that most of his patients, some of whom have been visiting his clinic for the last five years, felt that visiting government hospitals was an uphill task.

"It has become particularly troublesome for elderly persons who have not been able to go to the banks to withdraw cash. They still have old currency notes with them and not even all the medicine shops are accepting them," he said.

More than 100 diagnostic centres located near Capital Hospital are also bearing the brunt of demonetisation with a steep decline in patient footfall.

The owner of one such diagnostic centre, Mahesh Swain, said that he was getting only about 75 patients who were coming for various tests now. Earlier he used to get more than 300 patients a day.

"Diagnostic procedures take a lot of time at government hospitals and people prefer private facilities for several reasons. But, we are being forced to turn down the requests of many patients who want to pay us in the scrapped currency notes," he said.

Swain said the diagnostic centres mainly transacted in cash. "Only a few centres have terminals for debit or credit cards. We cannot accept cheques as realisation of payments in this mode takes time," he said.

Sales professional Rakesh Patra, a resident of Bapuji Nagar, said that he had to borrow money from a relative to get an MRI of his father done on an urgent basis.

"The MRI scan costs Rs 2,600 in private establishments. I have the money, but in scrapped currency notes. The amount I had withdrawn from the bank has already been exhausted. I do not use a debit card and took a loan of around Rs 5,000 from a relative to meet medical expenses," he said.

"People are being unnecessarily inconvenienced due to the demonetisation exercise of the government," he said.