Patients and their attendants sleeping in the open at SCBMCH | Express
CUTTACK: Even as the SCB Medical College and Hospital (SCBMCH) and Acharya Harihar Post Graduate Institute of Cancer(AHPGIC) daily attract thousands of patients and their attendees get thousands of patients and attendants every day, the two premier healthcare institutions are bereft of necessary amenities forcing them to take shelter under the open sky.
At AHPGIC, patients and attendants have to take shelter under the trees for several days. The 281-bed cancer hospital get 700 to 1,000 patients every day from across the State and outside. While there is a dharmashala on the campus, it can only house a maximum of 120 patients and their attendants. The rest stay under the open sky.
On an average, they stay on the campus for five to seven days to avail their diagnosis reports. “Since the hospital and dharmashala have no space, we have put up under a tree since the last five days. The diagnosis report is yet to come,” said a resident from Koraput who has come to the hospital along with his ailing relative. To tide over the mosquito menace, he had to purchase two mosquito nets and hang it from the tree.
AHPGIC Administrative Officer Rudra Narayan Dash said the patients’ inflow is always high which has resulted in this situation. “We cannot admit a patient till his/her biopsy report confirms carcinoma status. Since it takes around a week’s time, patients from distant districts prefer to stay back on the campus instead of going back”, Dash said.
Similarly, poor amenities and lack of shelters at 2,282-bed SCBMCH is a cause of concern. Over 5,000 patients come to the MCH daily. Even as a majority of them arrive from far off places and have to wait for several hours for registration and consultation, they face accommodation issues in the absence of shelters.
Many of the patients and their attendants at OPDs, super speciality block, Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Surgery, Orthopedic, Medicine and Paediatrics departments have time and again complained to the authorities concerned on the issue but to no respite. The MCH authorities should at least provide us waiting and rest rooms, they opined.The MCH authorities, however, clarified that the required facilities have been included in the hospital redevelopment plan.
