Pune: Pimrpi Chinchwad Municipal Corporation's plan to set up a dedicated burns ward has remained on paper, more than a year after an official announcement.
The decision to set up a burns ward in Pimpri Chinchwad was taken in Dec 2023 after 14 people were killed in a fire incident reported at a sparkling candle manufacturing unit in the Talawade. All the injured patients were taken to Sassoon General Hospital, which delayed the treatment, and the PCMC was blamed for the lack of a dedicated burns unit.
Civic officials on Wednesday said the burns ward was delayed due to the delay in shifting the existing Talera hospital, a civic facility, to a new building. The old building of the Talera hospital was finalised to set up the burns ward.
Laxman Gophane, the head of the PCMC's medical department, said the shifting of Talera hospital to a new building is in the final stage. "Some work related to the operation theatre at the new building was pending and that would likely be completed within the next month. Once Talera Hospital would be shifted to a new building, the process to set up the burns ward at the old building would be completed in around two months," he said.
Since there is no dedicated facility to treat burn patients in Pimpri Chinchwad, patients have to go to Sassoon General Hospital, a govt hospital in Pune city, or any other private hospital outside the city limits.
A senior PCMC official also confirmed that none of the private hospitals in Pimpri Chinchwad has the burns ward facility.
The municipal corporation had proposed a 30-bed facility for burn patients, including 12 beds for male and 12 beds for female patients, while 6 beds will be reserved for ICU. Once operational, PCMC's burns ward will be the govt facility with the highest number of beds for burn patients in the twin-city, as Sassoon Hospital has only 20 beds.
Initially, PCMC had proposed 24-bed facility, but increased the number of beds to 30.