Surgeries postponed due to Covid-19 in Pindi

Patients told to wait 3 to 6 months

RAWALPINDI:

With rise in coronavirus cases, routine surgical procedures at the three major hospitals in the garrison city have been postponed.

Officials told The Express Tribune that patients are being given three to six months waiting period for surgeries at the three allied hospitals including Benazir Bhutto Hispital (BBH), Holy Family Hospital (HFH) and the District Headquarters (DHQ) Hospital. Doctors are conducting only operations of emergency nature, they said.

It is not affordable for poor patients to get their operations done at private hospitals due to heavy expenses, therefore the come to government hospitals, however, due to pandemic patients are told to wait for months for the surgeries, officials said.

The Rawalpindi Institute of Cardiology (RIC), too, is conducting a very limited scale of cardiac surgeries in determining the nature of emergencies.

The cardiac surgeries that do not involve emergencies have been delayed.

The reason is said to be that after cardiac surgery, the patient may suffer from coronavirus in the hospital which may prove to be dangerous for the patients.

On the other side, the BBH has been transformed into a Covid-19 management hospital where operations scheduled for dates given earlier are being performed but the process of giving dates for new operations has been stopped.

The system of all kinds of surgeries is also very limited at the HFH due to coronavirus and patients turning up for gynecology, general, eye, orthopedic and other types of surgeries are sent back with the explanation that the process of surgeries has been stopped. Consequently, the difficulties of patients are increased as they are referred to private hospitals.

The DHQ Hospital is the only government hospital where orthopedic, neuro, general, and eye surgeries are being performed.

However, due to workload, surgeries are also being delayed at the hospital as getting dates for patients has become a daunting task.

Sources at government hospitals say it has become a necessity to limit all types of operations as surgeons see a greater risk given the severity of the coronavirus.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 5^th, 2020.