Increasing Covid beds a challenge for hospitals across state -Several healthcare centres now have to treat other patients too

Almost all private and government hospitals have reduced their Covid beds from December last year.:Shutterstock

Sanjay Mandal, Kinsuk Basu   |  TT  |  Calcutta   |   03.04.21: The state government wants hospitals across Bengal to increase Covid beds as the number of cases have started rising again but officials of several private and government healthcare facilities said that this was easier said than done.

Many of the hospitals said it would be difficult to increase the number of beds and take it to what it was during the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic because of the large number of non-Covid patients now. Unlike this time last year, there is no lockdown now and so, all types of patients have filled up non-Covid beds in hospitals.

Several hospitals are converting single rooms into twin-sharing ones to accommodate more Covid patients. But officials of these hospitals said even this would not allow them to increase the Covid beds to what it used to be in the middle of last year.

Almost all private and government hospitals have reduced their Covid beds from December last year. Also, the state government had converted several private hospitals into Covid treatment units, which have now resumed admitting non-Covid patients. Officials of these hospitals said it would be difficult to convert them into complete Covid hospitals again.

Peerless Hospital has 360 beds of which 38 are now designated for Covid patients. All 38 are occupied, said an official of the hospital. “Over 90 per cent of the non-Covid beds are also full. We are planning to convert some of the single rooms into twin-sharing ones to increase the number of Covid beds. However, even then we cannot increase the number to anywhere near 150 Covid beds, which we had till the end of December,” said Sudipta Mitra, chief executive, Peerless Hospital.

“Unlike during the lockdown, we have hundreds of non-Covid patients, many of whom had deferred their surgeries for a year because of the pandemic. Also, the number of emergency patients, like those who met with road accidents, has also gone up many times compared to the lockdown period,” said Mitra. He said the hospital has surgeries booked for the next two-and-half months.

At AMRI Hospital, Dhakuria, the authorities have increased the number of Covid beds to 55 on Friday. At the peak of the pandemic, the hospital had 90 Covid beds.

“We have already converted single cabins into twin-sharing rooms. We are planning to increase the capacity to 70 but it would be very difficult to reach 90,” said Rupak Barua, group CEO, AMRI. The group’s Salt Lake hospital was turned into a Covid hospital last year and now the 230-bed unit has 12 Covid beds. 

“Among the non-Covid beds, 180 are occupied so it will be difficult to shift all of the patients if we need to convert to a complete Covid treatment unit again,” said Barua.

Getting doctors and nurses for increased beds for Covid treatment is also an issue because they are engaged in treating non-Covid patients.

At meetings held with health officials from all the districts on Wednesday and Thursday, senior officials from Swasthya Bhavan have directed their counterparts in 23 districts of Bengal to identify healthcare facilities that can immediately be converted into Covid-19 hospitals. The officials have been instructed to submit reports with details of their requirements on how to make these hospitals functional within a week.

A section of senior officials from several districts said starting a new Covid hospital within a week was a tall order. While buildings and other infrastructure may be available, meeting the personnel shortage would be a challenge. 

Infectious Diseases Hospital in Beleghata has sought 40 doctors, 73 nurses and 18 lab technicians to cope with the increasing number of patients that were being admitted to the facility. On Friday, there were 60 Covid patients in the hospital with 12 of them admitted to the critical care unit and seven in the hospital’s high dependency unit.

“We have sought specialists from the field of chest, medicine, infectious diseases and public health along with nursing staff to cope with the pressure immediately,” said a senior official of the hospital.    

Similar demands have started pouring in at Swasthya Bhavan from other hospitals including Calcutta Medical College and Hospital, College of Medicine and Sagore Dutta Hospital in Kamarhati and MR Bangur Hospital. 

“We want to re-convert the KS Roy TB Hospital in Jadavpur into a Covid hospital. Several nurses who were earlier posted in this hospital  during the pandemic have been withdrawn and deputed to other health facilities,” said a health official.