RAWALPINDI: Deputy Commissioner Saifullah Dogar has sought help from the Punjab Specialised Healthcare and Medical Education Department to get possession of seven ambulances from the Benazir Bhutto and District Headquarters (DHQ) hospitals to be handed over to Rescue 1122.

The administration of both hospitals has opposed this and asked Rawalpindi Medical University Vice Chancellor Dr Mohammad Umer not to accept the district administration’s demand as the ambulances were purchased with development funds and are used to shift critical patients to allied hospitals in cases of emergency.

In a letter sent to the Punjab Specialised Healthcare and Medical Education department, Mr Dogar wrote:“Rescue 1122 is managing all kinds of emergencies in the metropolitan city and currently responding to an average of 120 emergencies per day with an average response time of seven minutes.”

“The service is also managing Patient Transfer Service (PTS) since last two years w.e.f 1st February, 2017. The undersigned has come to know from a reliable source that the tertiary care hospitals (Benazir Bhutto Hospital and District Headquarters Hospital) have received seven new ambulances from the health department. These ambulances are lying idle and are not in use for general public, thus leading to wastage of precious government asset,” the letter said.

The deputy commissioner assured that the ambulances would be utilised to commence emergency rescue services from Kahuta tehsil and to provide medical cover orsecurity related activities in the twin cities.

The hospitals’ administrations wrote a letter to Dr Umer stating that the hospital had purchased the ambulances from funds allocated by the Punjab government after 2017.

A senior official from Benazir Bhutto Hospital (BBH) told Dawn that the ambulances were being used to transfer critical patients from the hospital to other healthcare facilities.

In the past week, a policeman was injured in Kotli Sattian and he was shifted to the neurology department of DHQ hospital in an ambulance for an urgent operation due to a head injury.

He said that during the past three months, more than 800 patients had been shifted from Samli Sanatorium Murree, Holy Family Hospital and DHQ Hospital to BBH for C.T. scans and other facilities while pregnantwomen were also shifted to other hospitals because there was no space in the ward.

The ambulances are equipped with modern technology and are used for VIP and VVIP movement with a senior doctor and paramedical staff in case of need, he added.

Published in Dawn, January 10th, 2020