Kidney stones to stay, unit closed for 5 months

Sukkur Civil Hospital's lithotripsy machine breaks down due to neglect, patients cannot get treatment.

SUKKUR/HYDERABAD: Kidney stones are painful to begin with but if the only centre in your city providing the laser treatment (lithotripsy) has been closed for more than five months, then you are in even more trouble.

Hundreds of thousands of rupees were spent to set up the lithotripsy unit in Sukkur Civil Hospital. But the Rs55 billion machine used to disintegrate kidney stones was neglected for far too long. Finally, it broke down and now patients in Sukkur and its surrounding areas have nowhere to go.

Rizwan Ahmed, one of the oldest employees at the hospital, is a janitor who sees the machine gathering dust every day.

He said it pains him to see the futility of all the resources there. “Each day I open the office hoping the machine has been repaired but it has been five months now and nothing has been done,” he said.

Sukkur’s Civil hospital is not just the main health centre for Sukkur city’s residents but for people across the province. Due to the broken machine, patients have to go to Karachi, which is an added burden on their pockets.

According to the hospital administration, the machine has been shut down because of a faulty coil.

“The doctors are good, the treatment is free. But only when the machine is fixed can we all avail these facilities,” said Mohsin, a patient’s relative.

The unit was just set up two years ago but it poses a sorry sight these days. Dusty and silent, the plaster on its walls and ceiling is flaking and falling off.

The hospital’s out-patients department (OPD) records show that every day around 40 to 50 patients would come to this unit seeking treatment. Since the ward has been closed, around 3,000 people are waiting for the results of their reports and tests carried out as long as five months ago.

Hospital Medical Superintendent Dr Zulfiqar Shaikh said the machine provides treatment to all the people living in upper Sindh. They have written to the government, asking for help in fixing the machine. “We have set up such an expensive machine, we should be using it,” Dr Shaikh added.

Cardiac unit not working in Hyderabad

Meanwhile, in Hyderabad, it is the heart patients that are suffering. A cardiac unit was established by MQM chief Altaf Hussain’s 28-year-old nephew Arif Hussain at the General Hospital on Hali Road, Hyderabad. Inaugurated on December 4, 2009, the ward has yet to admit a single patient. The main problem is that the unit does not have a supply of medicines or of staff. The necessary equipment is there but there is nobody to handle all the machines.

The three-storey building has just one sweeper to keep it clean but even this man has no equipment because there is no “budget for cleanliness”. Doctors at the hospital collect money for the sweeper’s pay so they can sit in clean offices.

The ward comprises four beds and has a suction machine, scanners, defibrillators and other equipment worth Rs70,000 including an Echo machine, ETT machine and two ECGs machines. However, the health department never recruited technicians and experts to run this expensive machinery.

Moreover there are no air conditioners or standby generators or UPS, without which these machines cannot be used safely.

Even though the ward has not been used, there are cracks in the wall. Residents alleged that the management has used substandard material to construct the building.

As a result, these little careless mistakes have piled up to make the cardiac ward completely useless. Patients have to avail facilities in the city centre or Latifabad. Similarly, the gynecology ward at the General Hospital is also suffering due to a lack of technicians and medical staff.

additional reporting by Junaid Khanzada

Published in The Express Tribune, October 27^th, 2010.