Expensive proposition: BBH’s faulty CAT scanner forces patients to visit private labs
Hospital unable to acquire parts to fix machine four months after it broke down
Private labs PHOTO: FILE
RAWALPINDI:
Patients streaming to the main allied hospital in the garrison city have been forced to head to private laboratories to get a key medical scan done for the past four months after the hospital failed to repair its machine.
The computerized axial tomography (CAT) scanning machine allows doctors to see inside your body. It uses a combination of X-rays and a computer to create pictures of your organs, bones, and other tissues. It shows more detail than a regular X-ray.
The machine installed at the Benazir Bhutto Hospital (BBH) has been out of order for the past four months with the hospital unable to procure the necessary parts to repair it.
Kashan, who suffered a head injury in a road accident, said that he had to go to a private clinic just to get the scan done and it cost him Rs9,000 for a plain test, while Rs12,000 were being charged for contrast examinations.
He was of the view that it was not possible for even patients hailing from the middle class to bear the cost of such expensive tests at private laboratories or clinics.
BBH Deputy Medical Superintendent Dr Zafar Iqbal admitted that the CAT scan machine has been broken for the past four months. He added that repairs on the machine had stalled owing to unavailability of the requisite parts in the local market.
He disclosed that when it worked, the machine would conduct around five to 15 tests a day.
Dr Iqbal added that the hospital had bought the machine in 2015 at a cost of Rs55 million but was offering tests at a nominal rate of Rs1,600 for the regular test and Rs2,800 for the contrast tests.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 10th, 2018.
Patients streaming to the main allied hospital in the garrison city have been forced to head to private laboratories to get a key medical scan done for the past four months after the hospital failed to repair its machine.
The computerized axial tomography (CAT) scanning machine allows doctors to see inside your body. It uses a combination of X-rays and a computer to create pictures of your organs, bones, and other tissues. It shows more detail than a regular X-ray.
The machine installed at the Benazir Bhutto Hospital (BBH) has been out of order for the past four months with the hospital unable to procure the necessary parts to repair it.
Kashan, who suffered a head injury in a road accident, said that he had to go to a private clinic just to get the scan done and it cost him Rs9,000 for a plain test, while Rs12,000 were being charged for contrast examinations.
He was of the view that it was not possible for even patients hailing from the middle class to bear the cost of such expensive tests at private laboratories or clinics.
BBH Deputy Medical Superintendent Dr Zafar Iqbal admitted that the CAT scan machine has been broken for the past four months. He added that repairs on the machine had stalled owing to unavailability of the requisite parts in the local market.
He disclosed that when it worked, the machine would conduct around five to 15 tests a day.
Dr Iqbal added that the hospital had bought the machine in 2015 at a cost of Rs55 million but was offering tests at a nominal rate of Rs1,600 for the regular test and Rs2,800 for the contrast tests.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 10th, 2018.