Few beds, wards to treat H1N1 patients

MUMBAI: Several patients afflicted with influenza H1N1 in the city are forced to recuperate at home as hospitals shy away from admitting them. Patients are also being pushed to public hospitals, already crumbling under an influx of patients from the city and beyond. Ten of the 11 deaths this season have been of patients who came to Mumbai for advanced treatment.
Borivali resident Yogesh Dabhade is bitter about two major private hospitals in Andheri and Bandra refusing him admission. He tested positive for H1N1 soon after returning from a business trip to Delhi last week. “My physician advised me admission but I was turned away by two hospitals,” the CEO of a German company told TOI.
Dabhade finally had to drive all the way till Mahalaxmi to seek help from the BMC-run Kasturba Hospital on Saturday midnight. “I was pleasantly surprised when the doctor-on-duty checked me promptly and gave me medicines without any fuss,” he said. He said isolation would have probably protected his wife and daughter, who have now started showing symptoms of the infection. The 29-year-old pregnant wife of a state government employee is among several others being treating at home. “I speak to my doctor at least five to six times in a day to allay my fears,” she said.
“Beds are a problem and isolation facility is missing in most private hospitals, barring two or three,” said Dr Om Srivastava, infectious disease consultant at Jaslok Hospital that has two isolation beds. He added, “Scores of patients are being forced to take treatment at home because of want of beds,” he said.
Over 13,000 people have been screened for H1N1 in the city and nearly 900 tested. Of them, over 25% have tested positive. The city, however, has a little over 110 isolation beds to offer of which a majority are in the public sector.
CEO of Bhatia Hospital Shrikant Soman said, “We do not have the infrastructure to isolate. We are not equipped to treat infectious diseases, and do not want to jeopardize the safety of other patients.”
The state government has also asked all private hospitals to mandatorily create isolation facilities by October this year.