OPD services resume at PIMS
The outpatient department (OPD) of Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) has been reopened completely after a year. Pims officials said about 2,000 patients were examined on the first day, which is likely to exceed 5,000 patients a day in the coming days.
Addressing the ceremony, Pims Director Dr Minhajus Siraj and Dean Rizwan Taj said that the OPD of the largest tertiary care hospital of Islamabad was reopened for all patients which had been closed last year due to the coronavirus pandemic.
They stated that the hospital was only open for emergency services during the Covid-19 peak and doctors were examining the patients in wards and emergency department. The director further said that the OPD was renovated during the closure by a private housing society at its own expense.
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Dr Siraj said that some OPDs were open gradually as the virus relented but the operations were not completely resumed due to fear of another outbreak during the third wave of the pandemic virus. He added that thousands of patients are examined at OPDs, therefore, they resumed operations gradually.
The management said a letter to the health minister was sent over the non-restoration of central air-conditioning system at the facility. They added that the restoration of the AC system was supposed to be done by the housing ministry under the public sector development programme.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 2nd, 2021.