Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS), the state’s largest government hospital which is currently overwhelmed by Covid patients, has decided to shut OPD services from Monday amid the rising number of Covid cases.
The hospital has announced that it will strengthen its E-OPD services to offer online consultations for non-covid patients and continue its critical emergency unit to address serious cases.
“Considering the situation of the Covid-19 pandemic in Ranchi, it has been decided to shut down OPD services at RIMS from Monday till further notice. Those engaged in full-time OPDs will be diverted to serve at Covid care units at the hospital. To compensate closure of offline OPD, RIMS will try to run online services in a better way to help people,” said the notification issued by the management on Sunday evening.
The hospital has stated that offline OPD was proving detrimental since it was becoming increasingly difficult to follow R physical distancing norms due to the daily surge of patients. “This is also resulting in Covid cases among not just people but also staff and doctors of RIMS,” said the management.
An IMA functionary hoped that closing down OPD wouldn't end up posing unforeseen problems for non-Covid patients. “These are very tough times for everyone. Governments and administrations must also not ignore non-Covid patients, which could further aggravate the pandemic. The underprivileged, and the financially challenged are the ones who mostly turn up at OPDs outside RIMS. They are also the ones who aren’t very technologically sound to use online applications,” he said.
For Covid combat, RIMS has 223 beds for asymptomatic patients and 253 with oxygen support for people requiring critical treatment, as per district administration’s figures. The hospital’s Covid section is fully occupied at the moment as cases continue to pile up in Ranchi with more than 10,000 active cases, the highest ever since the outbreak of the pandemic.
Of about 2,000 doctors and other medical frontline workers at RIMS, at least 10 per cent are reported to be down with Covid since the last month, sources claimed.
The government is also working out plans to further increase beds for Covid care at RIMS.
