West Bengal's biggest Covid hospital to start non-Cov services

KOLKATA: Bengal's biggest Covid-19 hospital - MR Bangur Superspecialty Hospital - is all set to re-open its doors to non-Covid patients from January 3, after a gap of almost two years. The decision was taken by the state health department after considering the fact that the Covid graph in Bengal has remained stable for the last three to four months now.
"There is a sustained improvement of Covid-19 containment in the state.Bed occupancy has come down drastically while there is an increasing rush of non-Covid patients. Therefore, it is only prudent to start treating non-Covid patients at MR Bangur Hospital while a part of it continues to cater to Covid positives," said a senior health department official.
All other non-Covid services that the hospital offered before the pandemic will be now resumed. This includes both OPD and in-patient services in departments like general surgery, physical medicine, orthopaedics, eye, ENT, dental, plastic surgery and also emergency services. While the old block will continue to serve as a Covid hospital, the superspeciality building will be opened to general patients.
"The new superspecialty building that has about 500 beds will be opened to non-Covid patients while we will continue to operate 350 Covid beds," said MR Bangur medical superintendent Sisir Naskar.
Sources said the new building will undergo an overhaul, including sanitisation, so that the block is ready for taking in general patients from January.
The hospital was converted into a full-fledged Covid hospital during the first wave of the pandemic. Even as it started off with just about 300 beds, the facility kept expanding its Covid beds coinciding with the pandemic surge. From 441 beds in April, the health department scaled up the bed count to 713 during the second wave surge.
While all the 713 beds remain operational, only about 100 Covid patients are admitted at present. Of them, about 40% are either moderately or severely infected. During the pandemic, the hospital has catered to more that 15,000 patients. Though the hospital's OPD services were shifted to Baghajatin Hospital, doctors said that this alternative facility has restricted infrastructure. "Prior to Covid, our OPD footfall would be around 2,000 plus on a daily average," said Naskar.
"The reopening of non-Covid services will be a gain-gain for patients as well as PG students," said a consultant faculty.
With improvement in Covid scenario, the state health department had earlier converted a portion of Covid beds into non-Covid beds in many of its hospitals, including Medical College Hospital.