Covid positive scribe has fatal fall at Rims ICU toilet

RANCHI: In a rerun of an incident in July, a Dhanbad-based senior journalist admitted to Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (Rims) ICU with Covid-19 died of injuries after suffering a fall in the bathroom on the corridor outside the unit on Thursday morning. On July 19, a 70-year-old patient in the ICU had died after collapsing in the same bathroom and a probe was constituted with the hospital’s Covid taskforce being pulled up for negligence.
While the family of the decease have accused the hospital of negligence, a senior healthcare worker said they do not have enough staff to look after each and every patient admiyted to the ICU.
The 54-year-old scribe’s family said he was doing well till late on Wednesday night and his death came as a big shock. The patient was admitted to Rims along with his elder brother on Tuesday after they tested positive for Covid-19. “We were admitted to the D-1 ward, but doctors shifted him to the Covid ICU on Wednesday due to a fall in oxygen saturation level. On Wednesday evening, he told me he was feeling better and was on medication,” the victim’s brother said.
Another brother of the deceased said: “I called him on his cell more than 10 times between 7am and 8am on Thursday, but there was no response. I have been requesting the hospital authorities to handover his phone to us, but they are not co-operating. The doctors have to answer why a patient in the ICU was allowed to visit the washroom on his own?”
Sister Nisha, the nurse in-charge of the Covid ICU ward, said that the patient had gone to bathroom before he was given the medicines by the on-duty nurse. “When he did not return to his bed for some time, our housekeeping and nursing staff went to check on him and found him lying in the bathroom,” she said.
When asked why an ICU patient was sent to bathroom on his own, she said: “We have 20 patients in the ICU and only three nurses are on duty per shift. How can we take care of all the patients at the same time? The hospital management need to provide more manpower so that we can take proper care of each patient.”
While chief minister Hemant Soren expressed condolences over the senior journalist’s death, the hospital administration said it had no idea about the incident. Talking to TOI, Rims acting director Dr Manju Gari said: “I do not have any information about the issue as the hospital superintendent (Dr Vivek Kashyap) looks after patient care.” Kashyap said that while he knows that the man died at the ICU ward, he does not know the full details and circumstances in which he died.