HYDERABAD: When the Covid-19 pandemic added obstacles for patients with kidney issues, an NGO, Bhagwan Mahavir Jain Relief Foundation Trust (BMJRFT) provided dialysis services at subsidised rates, which is Rs 300, while private hospitals doubled their rates for the same.
“We had a situation where many patients began calling us saying that even after recovering from Covid and incurring high rates for dialysis, they were being asked to shell as much as Rs 8000 per dialysis session in private hospitals,” shared Gautam Chai Jain, Trustee, BMJRFT, which recently achieved the landmark of performing 10 lakh subsidised dialysis procedures across the State.
He further explained, “According to the guidelines, Covid-19 recovered dialysis patients were asked to take extra caution during the procedure due to the risk of reinfection as their immunity is already low. This added to the cost of consumables. However, our organisation decided to dedicate a 12-bed setup in Ameerpet for this and conducted 1,000 cycles of dialysis for Covid-19 recovered cases.”
The centre has been running since 2011 and was first established in King Koti District Hospital and was slowly expanded to eight centres with 189 machines, including centres at four associate hospitals, to provide services to more than 1,100 patients in the twin cities.
A 74 -year-old patient said that at the peak of the pandemic, private hospitals began charging double and even triple the rate. “More initiatives like this must come up because in March 2021, I felt the pinch and this centre came to my rescue. I need three sessions per week and in a corporate hospital, I was spending up to Rs 12,000 a week,” he shared.