Oxygen crunch keeps small hospitals on tenterhooks

PUNE: Medical expert Nitin Pawar of Pawar hospital in Dhankawadi on Thursday raised an alarm about a situation common in several small and medium-sized health hubs treating Covid-19 patients.
“We are left with oxygen supply that won’t last even for an hour,” said Pawar, whose hospital had 22 Covid-19 patients on oxygen beds, five in the intensive care unit (ICU) and a man on non-invasive ventilator support. “The 40-year-old man on the non-invasive ventilator support alone needs 12 jumbo cylinders in a day,” he said, regretting that the hospital’s SOS messages to the administration early in the day initially did not get much response.
“It is only after MP Supriya Sule’s intervention that the administration moved. I have sent my hospital supervisor to a refilling station to replenish the empty cylinders. He is unlikely to reach within an hour. I am trying to borrow some cylinders from other hospitals to support my patients,” Pawar said.
Rising hospital in Chandannagar was left with oxygen cylinders that would exhaust in three-and-a-half hours. The hospital has 32 patients in the ICU and as many on basic oxygen support. “We are not getting enough supply of medical oxygen. We may require shifting of all our ICU patients. Please help us with oxygen supply,” the hospital’s SOS message is making rounds on various networking groups of doctors.
The Covid-19 case surge has pushed the city’s health infrastructure to the brink. Patients are scrambling for hospital beds — mainly those supported by oxygen — and ICU beds with ventilators. Doctors said small and medium-sized hospitals have no option, but to stop taking new admissions as there has been no guarantee of getting uninterrupted oxygen supply.
“It has been more than 15 days now and there has been no respite. The situation is simply going from bad to worse every day,” said Sanjay Patil, chairman of the Indian Medical Association’s Hospital Board of India — a body of small and medium-sized hospitals in Pune.
Officials involved in the mitigation of the oxygen deficit claimed the situation started improving from April 25 with the drop in daily caseload in the Pune Metropolitan Region. “The situation will worsen if urgent steps are not taken,” said health activist Abhijit More.