Hospitals admitting only serious patients
MUMBAI: Wards at civic hospitals are packed to their capacity, so much so that every bit of floor space is taken up by patients. The already skewed patient-bed ratio of one is to 3,000 has become worse since the outbreak. BMC’s executive health officer Dr Girish Ambe said: “More than 25% of the civic beds are occupied by patients suffering from malaria and fever. Nearly 4,000 people have already been hospitalised this month.’’ A senior doctor at the civic-run KEM Hospital said that doctors are admitting only serious cases: “We treat the rest and send them home.’’
Private hospitals, nursing homes and general practitioners are also reporting a similar trend. “This year, the number of people coming down with malaria is overwhelming,’’ said a consultant physician at Breach Candy Hospital. He added that infrastructure and construction work, lack of hygiene and inadequate means of vector control are the main reasons for the rise in malaria cases.
The dearth of beds is underlined by the fact that several smaller hospitals and nursing homes are admitting only those people who are critical. A case in point is the 15-bed Dr Gandhi’s nursing home at Dadar, which is currently treating 13 malaria patients. “Over the past few weeks, 90% of my beds are being occupied by patients suffering from fever and malaria,’’ said the director of the hospital, Dr Manoj Gandhi. He said that the same scene was being played out in other nursing homes in the area as well. At Good Health nursing home in Jogeshwari, 15 of the 24 beds are occupied by patients showing symptoms of the disease. “We have been turning away four to five patients every day as we have no beds,’’ said the duty officer.
Many of the larger and more expensive private hospitals have also noted the sudden surge. “We are mostly trying to treat malaria and fever patients on an OPD basis but some patients, out of fear, insist on hospitalisation,’’ said Dr A V Hegde of the internal medicine department in P D Hinduja Hospital. In Jaslok Hospital, out of 64 patients treated for malaria around 29 had to be hospitalised.
Around 49 lab technicians at Kasturba Hospital are scanning more than 3,500 blood samples for malaria strains. “The staff’s weekly holidays have been cancelled,’’ said Dr Kishore Harugoli, assistant health officer, malaria surveillance. The BMC is discouraging doctors from prescribing malaria drugs indiscriminately. Nearly 3,500 doctors have been warned. “The state is conducting a study to see if there is any resistance to the first line malaria drugs in the city,’’ said Ambe.