Delhi govt orders its hosps to resume all medical services
New Delhi: The Delhi government on Wednesday issued orders on Wednesday for all hospitals under its jurisdiction to resume all medical services, including surgical and invasive procedures, following decreasing COVID-19 cases in the city.
The January 27 order of the Health and Family Welfare department stated, "In view of the decrease in the number of Covid-19 cases in Delhi, all kinds of surgeries/ invasive procedures/IPD/OPDs and other medical services shall be started in all Hospitals under the GNCT of Delhi, including the Society Hospitals."
This would affect both major teaching hospitals under the Delhi government, Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Hospital (LNJP) and Guru Tegh Bahadur Hospital (GTB), which have been handling a bulk of the city's COVID-19 patients. At Lok Nayak, Medical Director Dr Suresh Kumar said, "Operation Theatre services were resumed on January 27, in line with internal orders issued earlier. OPD services have been functional since January 4".
However, LNJP's OT services had only 3 or 4 patients as per Dr Kumar although that number is likely to pick up in the next few days. With this, LNJP has resumed its in-patient, out-patient, casualty and emergency services, confining its COVID-19 services to one block on the premises.
"We currently have 32 COVID-19 patients, including those who have the UK strain of the virus", Dr Kumar confirmed, adding that "surgical, maternity, and orthopedic emergency services have been re-started in full swing, among others".
At Guru Tegh Bahadur hospital, all medical services, including OPDs, in-patient admissions, surgeries, OT, casualty and emergency departments, had resumed functioning in full capacity from January 21 onwards, Dr Sandeep Yadav, president of GTB's Resident Doctors' Association said. GTB currently has 16 COVID-19 patients, with 184 of its 200 beds lying vacant, a senior resident at the hospital said.
Other hospitals under the Delhi government, such as Dr Baba Saheb Ambedkar Hospital, Deen Dayal Upadhyay Hospital, Deep Chand Bandhu Hospital, Guru Gobind Singh Hospital, Satyawadi Raja Harish Chandra Hospital, among others, have also resumed non-Covid-19-medical services.
Earlier, medical services at these hospitals, which have considerably lesser bed capacity than either LNJP or GTB, had been lying dormant or functioning under strict restrictions due to the high number of COVID-19 cases.
