CUTTACK: Struggling to cope with an acute shortage of beds, and government apathy for increasing the number despite high volume of admissions, as many as eight major departments of SCB Medical College and Hospital are forced to provide treatment to the patients on the floor of the wards’ corridors.
Patients, many of them critical, lying in miserable conditions on the corridors and verandahs of the wards presents a dismal picture of healthcare services being provided at the premier hospital of the State. The departments such as medicine, paediatrics, neurology, nephrology, gastroenterology, cardiology, obstetrics and gynaecology and orthopedic are the worst hit.
As per reports, the number of sanctioned beds for 26 clinical departments of SCB MCH is 2,052, of which 2,401 beds are presently available with alternative arrangements. In the medicine department, as many as 475 beds are functioning against 422 sanctioned beds. The bed occupancy at the department is at 148 per cent. Similarly, 78 beds are operational against 58 sanctioned beds in the paediatrics department, with the bed occupancy at 125 per cent.
Barring gastrointestinal surgery department whose bed occupancy is 53 per cent, there are no departments where occupancy is less than 80 per cent. Mostly critical patients admitted to SCB MCH are failing to get a bed and are forced to receive treatment on the floor of a ward, also leading to discontentment among their attendants.
However, SCB MCH Administrative Officer Dr. Abinash Rout said the situation is because of the increasing inflow of patients to the departments. “The daily footfall of the patients at SCB MCH has increased considerably and at present above 7,000. But there will be no such problem after the redevelopment work of the hospital is completed,” Rout said.