PESHAWAR: Patients from quake-hit areas discharged before recovery
By Sadia Qasim Shah
PESHAWAR, Nov 22: Patients from earthquake-hit areas have complained that they have been shifted to a relief centre in Hayatabad before their recovery due to shortage of beds in government hospitals.
Mohammad Rafaqat, 14, with severe fractures, had been brought from Balakot, a town badly hit by the Oct 8 quake, and admitted to the Khyber Teaching Hospital (KTH) last month.
Rafaqat said that he had been admitted to the KTH orthopaedic ward for six weeks but just after 22 days, doctors sent him to the relief centre, a shelter for quake survivors.
His elder brother said that there was a shortage of beds in the hospital, compelling the doctors to shift Rafaqat to the relief centre.
Currently, the relief centre houses 336 survivors, 85 of them with fractured legs and arms. The survivors include 73 children, 29 of them injured. The centre provides some medicines, including pain-killers, available at its dispensary.
“The patients in the relief centre are in dire need of medical care and medicines. We have requested donor agencies to provide us with medicines,” said Yunus Afridi, evening shift in-charge of the centre.
“The relief centre has emergency medicines but expensive medicines for heart and gynaecological patients are not available with us,” said Robina Riaz, the in-charge of the centre.
Sher Bano, 50, a resident of Mansehra, whose 20 years old son and 15 years old daughter had received severe fractures, complained of poor services and food being provided at government hospitals. Her daughter has been admitted to the KTH and her son is getting treatment at a hospital in Abbottabad.
“Some of those injured in the quake and admitted to the orthopaedic wards were over-staying there with their attendants, sources said.
“The patients with minor fractures have been shifted to the relief centre as the orthopaedic ward at the KTH has only 76 beds,” KTH administers said.
“Patients from the quake-hit areas were provided VIP treatment at the hospital,” a staff member said and denied that they were shifted to the relief centre before their recovery because of a shortage of beds at the hospital. The administration got the number of operations being carried out there daily from two to five.
