TAXILA: The Punjab chief minister health monitoring committee chairman, Malik Hameed Akbar, has said the District Headquarters Hospital in Attock will be transformed into a state-of-the-art health facility.

He was talking to newsmen during his visit to the hospital on Friday. Medical Superintendent Dr Jawwad Elahi and other officials of the health department were also present on the occasion.

Mr Akbar visited various departments and wards of the hospital including OPD, emergency, medical wards, trauma centre, dialysis centre, laboratory, blood bank as well as medicine counter.

The patients and their attendants also apprised him about the paucity of staff, medicines as well as other facilities.

During his interaction with the patients Malik Hameed Akbar was informed that in case of fatal emergencies and road accidents, patients were referred to other hospitals in Rawalpindi during which most of the critical patients died on their way.

He said patients had lodged complaints about lack of medicines and other facilities, adding that people suffering from kidney diseases were facing problems due to shortage of dialysis machines.

He said at present there were only 11 machines available, and another eight would be made available soon.

He said the trend of transferring patients to hospitals and health centres of other districts would be discouraged as it not only led to the death of patients on the way but also caused inconvenience to them and their attendants.

Mr Akbar further said that he would pay surprise visits during the day as well as nights to check attendance of the staff on duty and availability of other facilities.

Earlier, Medical Superintendent Dr Jawad Elahi briefed the committee chairman about the facilities provided to the patients as well as the problems they faced.

Published in Dawn, August 31st, 2024