PESHAWAR: Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Health Care Commission has completed a survey aimed at utilising the infrastructure of the private hospitals if the Covid-19 pandemic aggravates and requires more beds, personnel and facilities.

“We have completed a survey and reached agreements with private hospitals in the province for utilising their facilities in case number of Covid-19 infected people increases,” Dr Maqsood Ali, chief executive officer of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Health Care Commission (HCC), told Dawn.

The commission has carried a detailed analysis of the province-wide private health facilities and selected 139 hospitals where 614 beds have been made available to be used for the critically-ill Covid-19 patients requiring hospitalisation in high dependency units (HDUs) or intensive care units (ICUs).

“These facilities have 194 ventilators, which can be offered to the patients free of cost. The cooperation by private sector during the pandemic is unprecedented,” said Dr Maqsood.

HCC completes survey and inks agreements with private health facilities for the purpose

The hospitals also have 264 oxygen concentrators, which can be utilised but at the moment the patients’ flow is not that much and the public sector hospitals are able to cope with the situation. It is apart from the allocation of beds at the government hospitals, where more than 1000 beds have been dedicated to the Covid-19 patients.

The HCC is monitoring both the public and private sector facilities, the availability of staff, equipment and infrastructure as the main aim is to extend quality services to Covid-19 patients and keep the virus away from infecting people, who can be saved.

“It has taken over two months to complete the survey to come with a list of facilities that fulfils the requirements for the management and treatment of the Covid-19 patients,” said Dr Maqsood.

All the Peshawar-based private hospitals including Mercy Teaching Hospital, Kuwait Teaching Hospital, Naseer Teaching Hospital, Rehman Medical Institute, North West General Hospital, Zia Medical Complex, Shaukat Khanum Memorial Hospital and Research Centre and others have pledged 135 emergency beds, 101 ventilators and oxygen concentration systems for Covid-19 patients.

However, at present, the public sector medical teaching institutions were taking the patients’ load, he said.

Dr Maqsood said that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was the only province where such standby arrangements had been put in place. He said that highly trained and qualified staffed of those hospitals would voluntarily manage the Covid-19 patients.

“These facilities, which have good infrastructure, are located in all districts, especially in Peshawar, Malakand, Swat, Mardan etc from where most patients are coming. The owners of these private outlets have expressed willingness to offer the services of their consultants and other staff when the government needs,” said DR Maqsood.

He said that alongside the Covid-19 patients, they were also working to reopen private clinics.

He said that they developed standard operating procedures (SoPs) to ensure treatment of people but at the same time put in place safe precautions for patients, their relatives and health workers including doctors.

“A committee with representatives of private health establishments has been constituted which is working in collaboration with HCC to restart operations of private clinics and hospitals,” said Dr Maqsood. He said that once the clinics were open, the HCC would consistently monitor implementation of SoPs.

HCC, in accordance with its mandate, is also monitoring the operations of the private laboratories authorised by government to conduct Covid-19 testing with a view to make sure that standards protocols are maintained.

Published in Dawn, May 20th, 2020