THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: With more women who require prenatal care returning to the district from abroad, the district medical office (DMO) has decided to upgrade Fort Hospital as a Covid care centre exclusively for asymptomatic and symptomatic pregnant women. Currently, the Women and Children Hospital (W&C) at Thycaud and Sree Avittam Thirunal (SAT) Hospital deal with prenatal cases.
“SAT treats all high-risk cases, while normal delivery cases are referred to Women and Children Hospital. Since the number of women coming from abroad and requiring prenatal care is on the rise, we have decided to establish a Covid care centre in Fort Hospital only to tend to pregnant women who have minor
symptoms, are asymptomatic or have a travel history in red zones. We will maintain W&C as a non-Covid care hospital,” said a health official.
increase in flow of patients to W&C
The flow of patients and number of deliveries in W&C have gone up drastically since the outbreak. In May alone, the hospital recorded around 550 deliveries, which are the highest compared to figures recorded before the lockdown.
“Since SAT treats Covid patients, people feel W&C is safer, as a result of which the number of OP patients has increased. Also, several patients consulting SAT are being referred to us for prenatal care and we have so far been able to accommodate all of them without any issues,” said an official with W&C. Patients who have neurological or cardiac complications are referred to SAT Hospital, said the official. “Only SAT Hospital is equipped to treat such complicated cases as there are specialist doctors there,” added
the official.
Fort Hospital all set to go
The DMO has already held discussions with authorities of Fort Hospital and all arrangements are in place to deal with pregnant Covid suspects. “Besides our maternity block, which has 12 beds, we have 50 more beds that can accommodate pregnant Covid suspects. Those with severe symptoms and other complications will be referred to SAT Hosptial,” said an official with Fort Hospital. The official said that Fort Hospital has started taking swab samples and has so far sent 150 samples for testing, all of which came back negative. Fort Hospital covers around five corporation wards and provides medical assistance to suspected Covid cases in paid quarantine centres. “We have an on-call doctor and medical team to provide assistance to suspected cases in Covid centres,” added the official.