Soon, hospital bed allocation for COVID patients in Karnataka to be on lines of hotel booking

BENGALURU: Learning from their experience in allocating beds for COVID-19 patients during the first and second wave, experts and officials working with the state and BBMP war room have come up with a new system.

In this, bed blocking will be similar to how hotel rooms are booked using the channel manager software. Officials are working full time to bring in the new system in 2-3 months, before a potential third wave.

“Though the software will be on the same lines of hotel room booking, it will be different. Through channel manager, room availability is known in real time by customers and travel agents globally as check-in and check-out of each hotel is linked to it. The same is being planned for government and private hospitals for bed blocking now,” a government official told The New Indian Express, on condition of anonymity.

Just like in hotels, the type of beds, rates and services available will be listed out. Through this, citizens will be able to check availability, compare and choose the best and nearest hospital for treatment. This will bring in healthy competition and transparency, the official added.

The need for this arose because despite government orders, many private hospitals did not reserve 50 per cent beds for government referred patients. There were also many cases where patients were charged exorbitantly for treatment.

“Despite there being a state war room portal, BBMP portal and private hospitals’ management portal, all hospitals are still not on board. The health department and BBMP still does not have a list of all hospitals in Bengaluru or Karnataka and total beds for treatment. Same is the case with medical colleges. Through this new system, all portals and applications will be linked including the war rooms, CHBMS, SAST, Index and others. The plan is to complete development and trials within three months and make it operational before the third wave (likely in September),” the official added.

The government has given in-principle approval for the new system. However, many hospitals are not convinced. Meetings are being held to bring them under one umbrella, explaining the gravity of the situation.

Dr Prasanna HM, PHANA President, said the new system will be helpful but there are instances of harassment from government officials so hospital managements were not keen.