BHUBANESWAR: Chaos continues to reign supreme in the State Capital as shortage of ICUs, high dependency units (HDUs) and NICU beds has left hundreds of critical patients at the mercy of Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) to get admitted to a hospital.
Officials said except SUM dedicated Covid hospital (DCH), almost all other DCHs and major private hospitals have run out of ICU and general beds.
As per the statistics of Health department, 91 per cent (pc) ICU, HDU and NICU beds in the city hospitals had remained occupied till May 14. Detection of another 1,118 new Covid cases against 885 recoveries in last 24 hours has altered this occupancy status further.
Till Friday, the total strength of ICU, HDU and NICU beds in the city was 1,124 of which 932 have remained occupied. Hi-Tech and Sparsh having 48 and 47 beds respectively have 100 pc occupancy. KIMS with 110 beds also has 100 pc occupancy, while Aditya Ashwini having 90 beds has 90 per cent occupancy.
KIDS hospital with 45 ICU beds also has around 85 pc occupancy, while Neelachal and Blue Wheel hospital with 70 beds each has 92 pc and 88.57 pc occupancy.
The SUM Covid hospital, having the highest number of 644 beds, is the only DCH where the occupancy is 74.22 pc. A few hospitals, including Hi-Tech, have also kept some of the ICU beds reserved for indoor patients, causing more trouble to the patients needing critical Covid care.
Despite explosion of Covid cases in the city, neither the State government nor the BMC has taken any significant measures to increase the bed strength. Critical patients and their family members are also facing hurdles due to absence of any mechanism to get the status of ICU or HDU beds in city hospitals.
With helplines opened by the government, BMC as well as hospitals not sharing any details of bed occupancy status, social media accounts of government agencies including the Health department and BMC are getting flooded with SOS alert seeking admission of critical patients everyday day.
Municipal Commissioner Sanjay Kumar Singh, however, said the civic body is taking measures to increase the bed strength in the city including ICU beds. Sources said the 70 ICU beds in Hi-Tech DCH and 50 ICU beds in KIMS DCH will be added soon.
BMC mulls isolation facilities in hotels
The BMC is planning to create isolation bed facility in city hotels for mild patients to reduce burden on Covid hospitals. Municipal Commissioner Sanjay Kumar Singh held a virtual meeting with various hotel owners to explore the possibility of creating isolation facilities in hotel rooms.
“We have suggested the members of hotel association to tie up with hospitals to create isolation beds with oxygen for mild symptomatic patients on the lines of cities like Mumbai, Bengaluru and Delhi,” he said.
The private hospitals and members of hotel association have welcomed the suggestion. At present, the city has three paid isolation and quarantine facilities.