KOHAT: The KDA Teaching Hospital has been short of vital equipment and doctors for last one decade, as a result, patients have to be referred to Peshawar hospitals, and often the critical onesdie on the way.

The hospital was established to cater to the healthcare needs of people from Kurram, Orakzai, Hangu, Kohat and Darra Adamkhel. The people getting injured in road accidents, bomb blasts and with burn injuries are referred to Peshawar.

Medical superintendent Dr Raheem told Dawn that he had been writing to the provincial health department for provision of equipment and appointment of sanctioned doctors, but to no avail.

A relevant official did not give a satisfactory answer when asked as to how many patients were referred to Peshawar in a month.

Sources said the hospital was established as a category-A facility in 2000, but it remained in category-C due to shortage of funds. Then after hue and cry by the people it was placed in category-A.

People hoped that the upgraded hospital would rid them of the trouble of going to Peshawar, but to their utter shock it has not been provided with any gadgets required for a category-A health facility.

Even the burns centre funded by former MNA Khursheed Begum during the ANP government is still non-functional. It needs 96 medical officers and specialist doctors but the posts have long been lying vacant, the sources said.

Zahir Shah, a local, said he brought his mother to the hospital’s emergency the other day, but the doctors, after examining her, asked him to take her to Peshawar.

A youngster, who was shot and injured, was brought to the hospital the other day, but as the hospital lacked a trauma centre, CT Scan and MRI he was referred to Peshawar. He succumbed to injuries in a Peshawar hospital.

Atif Khan, another local, who was severely beaten up and injured by robbers on the Hangu Road, was also referred to Peshawar.

Similarly, heart patients are also being asked to go to Peshawar.

The people said not everybody was financially sound enough to bear the expenses of carrying patients to Peshawar. They also alleged that the doctors mostly prescribed costly medicines which were not available in the hospital.

They demanded of the local lawmakers to order purchase of the vital equipment from the hefty royalty funds.

Published in Dawn, May 16th, 2020