MCI NORMS THROWN TO WINDS: 750 bedded SMGS hospital in Jammu has no ICU

In blatant violation of MCI norms, the 750-bedded SMGS hospital, a premier maternity and pediatric facility in Jammu, functions without an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) due to which critical patients are sent to the Government Medical College and Hospital (GMC&H), Jammu.

Sources informed that though the hospital has 10 ventilators, “it doesn’t have a common ICU with all facilities” for treatment of critically ill patients as per the MCI guidelines.

   

The ICU is the basic requirement of any hospital where critically ill patients are admitted, experts said. 

Sources said even the ventilators in the hospital— 6 in NICU ward and 4 in PICU ward—do not get the required suction pressure (oxygen) which adversely affects their functioning.

Official sources informed that in a meeting convened by the health minister sometime back, the need for having an ICU at the hospital was appreciated. “Yet nothing concrete has been done till date”.

They said, “As of now, the ICU is only in the minutes of the meeting”. 

“The anesthesia department is yet to prepare a proposal in this regard. The proposal would have to go to the higher authorities for formal approval,” they said.

A senior doctor said that having mere ventilators doesn’t mean that you have an ICU. “A full-fledged ICU with all facilities including technicians, paramedical staff, doctors and other facilities is the basic requirement of the hospital for treatment of critical patents,” the doctor said.

Medical superintendent SMGS hospital, Raj Kumar Sangra said the process for setting up of the ICU has been started.

“The paper work has been started and very soon a proposal will be submitted by the dead, department of the anesthesia, after which it will be forwarded to the concerned higher authorities,” the superintendent told Greater Kashmir. 

The SMGS hospital is the premier health facility of the Jammu region which caters to entire Jammu province right from Doda and Kishtwar at one end to Rajouri and Poonch at the other.

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