Srinagar, June 21: In a major reprieve to patients, J&K Government has started admitting COVID19 patients at the 500-bed DRDO facility here, in order to restart routine patient care at SKIMS Soura and SMHS Hospital after months of halt.
“We are planning to start non-emergency and routine healthcare at SKIMS Soura and SMHS Hospital this week,” Additional Chief Secretary Health and Medical Education, AtalDulloo said. He said the Health and Medical Education Department had already started admitting patients at the new temporary 500-bed DRDO Hospital at Khanmoh and more patients were being shifted to the new facility. “It is a state-of-art advanced healthcare set-up, specifically designed for the requirements of COVID19 patients,” he said. Dulloo said that manpower for providing optimum care and treatment had been designated for the hospital. “A lot of staff, especially doctors, were recruited last week. Now we are in the process of recruiting technical and other categories of staff on fast track,” he said.
The Hospital, he said, would take over the operations for treatment of COVID19 patients in a full-fledged manner enabling the department to start routine operations at other major hospitals which had been designated as COVID19 facilities.
Medical Superintendent DRDO Hospital, Dr Abdul Rasheed Parra said the hospital admitted six patients recently as trial, two of them on oxygen support. “We discharged three patients after they recovered,” he said. Dr Parra said the hospital was capable of taking a major load of COVID19 patients and called the facility a “game changer”. He said the DRDO Hospital has 375 ward beds, all having oxygen ports that can deliver upto 15 litre per minute. In addition, there are 125 ICU beds, all ventilator supported which can provide high flow oxygen. “We have convertible systems and can increase oxygen capacity in ward beds too if needed,” he said.
At SKIMS Soura, OPDs and admissions, except emergencies, for all departments were closed down on 07 April. SMHS Hospital followed the practice soon after when it allocated its multiple wards to COVID19. Currently, COVID19 has taken over both of these general and advanced specialty Hospitals that form the core of the tertiary healthcare in Kashmir division and for many districts in Pir Panchal. Dulloo said healthcare for all was necessary and since the number of patients requiring admission for infection of SARS-CoV2 had decreased alleviating the burden on hospitals, the Government was in a position to restart routine work “to a great extent”.
Currently, 112 COVID patients are admitted at SMHS Hospital, 118 at SKIMS Soura and 24 at SKIMS Medical College Hospital Bemina.