Inactive CT scan machine irks patients

DHQ Hospital’s vital equipment has been dysfunctional for over two months

RAWALPINDI:

Citizens are facing a plethora of problems as more than two months have passed since the CT scan machine, an important medical equipment used to diagnose disease or injury as well as to plan medical, surgical or radiation treatment in critically injured patients, broke down in the only trauma centre of the Rawalpindi district.

Critically injured patients of traffic and criminal incidents, who arrive in the Rawalpindi District Headquarters Hospital, are shifted to the Holy Family Hospital for digital imaging which has become a constant source of nuisance for the patients as well as their attendants.

The prolonged failure of the CT scan machine in the trauma centre is also causing delays in neuro surgeries and other operations, increasing the difficulties for the patients as well as for the surgeons performing these procedures.

Hospital sources told The Express Tribune that the DHQ Hospital’s trauma centre is the only facility in the entire district where patients arrive not only from the Rawalpindi district but also from the neighbouring Azad Kashmir, Gilgit Baltistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa regions.

They said the majority of patients referred to the DHQ Hospital are those who are suffering from serious skull or backbone injuries only to find out that the CT scan machine in the district’s only trauma centre has been dysfunctional for the last two months.

These patients are transferred to the Holy Family Hospital for a CT scan in critical condition and again shifted back to the DHQ Hospital after their scans are conducted.

The sources said shifting critically ill and injured patients from one hospital to another requires an ambulance with the latest equipment and relatives of the patients are asked for making arrangements for such ambulances on their own.

Relatives of patient Shahid Ghufran, who was injured in a traffic accident in Azad Kashmir and reached DHQ Hospital, said that their patient was referred to the DHQ Hospital from Mirpur.

“Our patient arrived at the hospital in a critical condition due to head injuries. The neurosurgeons here seek CT scan test reports for a detailed examination of such patients. Shahid was transferred to the Holy Family Hospital, where dozens of patients were already present after the DHQ Hospital’s CT scan machine malfunctioned,” they said.

“Three hours were lost for the CT scan test and when we came back to the hospital, the doctors had left,” they added.

They said the condition of the trauma centre had worsened because of the non-availability of the CT scan machine. “The poor patients are forced to move from pillar to post,” they lamented and demanded the caretaker government arrange for immediate repair of the CT scan machine.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, a senior doctor told The Express Tribune that all officials of the hospital administration and the health department were very well aware that the CT scan machine had become dysfunctional.

“Despite this, no special efforts are being made to repair the machine,” he claimed and added that whenever the neurosurgeons complain they are told that the caretaker government was not releasing funds for the repair of medical equipment.

The doctor said that if the issue of malfunction of the machine was not removed soon, the lives of the critical patients requiring immediate medical attention may be lost.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, May 20^th, 2023.