On Wednesday, 13 bed-ridden and abandoned patients for whom Ward 9 of General Hospital here was literally their home for years were rehabilitated at a care home at Mulanthuruthy in Ernakulam district.

The District Legal Services Authority (DLSA) facilitated the rehabilitation of the patients, the youngest being 29 and the oldest 81, at Bethlehem Geriatric Care Home, Painungalpara, Mulanthuruthy.

Some of them had been living in Ward 9 for nearly five years for no one had come back to claim them. Abandoned by family and without any caregivers, they continued to live on at the hospital.

The legal clinic functioning in Ward 9 of General Hospital initiated steps to rehabilitate them to a facility where they could get the care and attention they deserved.

They were shifted to Mulanthuruthy in 12 ambulances along with a medical team to ensure the journey was uneventful.

The expenses for the ambulances was met by a trust functioning in the name of the daughter of Suresh Gopi, MP.

The send-off was attended by the MP, DLSA secretary and sub-judge S. Shamnad, General Hospital Superintendent Krishnaveni, hospital officials and staff, legal clinic lawyer Sreeja Sasidharan, and paralegal volunteers Thamees and Kumarilekha.