LAHORE, Sept 11: The emergency department of the Shaikh Zayed Hospital (SZH) badly needs urgent expansion and renovation as ills like shortage of regular senior doctors, nurses and paramedics and poor infrastructure affect its working.

At a time when dengue virus has hit the Punjab capital, the doctors deputed at the 26-bed SZH emergency seem helpless in attending a large number of patients in a congested space. A good number of patients are either referred to other hospitals owing to scarcity of adequate space and facilities or left at the mercy of just over half a dozen overburdened doctors.

The hospital administration and authorities concerned have turned a deaf ear to the pressing need of the general public as well as doctors to expand the department and enhance its capacity to simultaneously cater to a large number of patients.

Public sector hospitals across the province refer critical kidney, gastroenteritis and liver patients to the health facility commissioned in 1986 with only 26-bed emergency department. The department seems ‘tiny” as compared to similar departments of other public sector hospitals in the provincial capital.

The initially 360-bed hospital was gifted by UAE’s founder president Shaikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al-Nahayan to the then prime minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, for the “people of Lahore”. Being governed by the Cabinet Division of the federal government, the hospital underwent expansion in following years and its capacity almost doubled and rose to 713 beds in 2004 with addition of many new blocks and ancillary paraphernalia. However, the emergency department experienced no expansion/renovation at all, and it is still a 26-bed facility as it was when first opened 25 years ago with the same number of staff and facilities sanctioned from the outset.

According to sources, the higher authorities sitting in Islamabad are paying no heed to improve ‘pathetic’ condition of the emergency department which is commonly known as ‘gateway’ to specialised treatment at any health facility.

Sources said that it was astonishing that the 1,050-bed health institution had an emergency department with 26 beds and seven regular doctors to cater to at least 1,500 patients daily. According to the institute’s official website, the health facility progressed considerably over the last 20 years and its present bed strength had reached 1,050. (The hospital administrator, however, clarified that website figurers were erroneous and its strength was still 713.)All the departments of this hospital have been recognised by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Pakistan for fellowships. Beside, a full-fledged multi-storey kidney centre and a liver transplant centre, Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al-Nahayan Medical and Dental College, Federal Postgraduate Medical Institute, National Health Research Complex, National Institute of Kidney Diseases and Shaikha Fatima Institute of Nursing and Health Sciences are the hospital’s major institutions.

Sources said that nobody knew as to why the emergency department was not being expanded despite enormous development of hospital’s other facilities over the years.“Only two doctors are handling 500 patients in one shift these days. The number of patients does not drop below 200 in normal days,” sources added.

They said the situation deteriorated further after two senior doctors from the present strength of the emergency department were posted deputy and assistant administrators, respectively, without making alternative postings.

One of the major reasons behind this neglect was a paucity of funds to carry out expansion of the vital department while another one was a lack of interest on the part of the administration to improve its functioning, they added.

The severity of SZH emergency department’s congestion could be gauged from the fact that three leading hospitals of Lahore had far more facilities to simultaneously attend to a much larger number of patients.

The emergency departments of the provincial government’s health institutions are being run under the Strengthening Emergency Medical Services Programme launched by former chief minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi and now multiple-storey buildings house accident and emergency departments of all the teaching hospitals in the Punjab capital.

“Around 100 or so doctors are providing treatment to patients at the 140-bed emergency department of 2,000-bed Mayo Hospital,” medical superintendent Dr Zahid Pervez told Dawn.

Dr Qaisra Perveen, who is director of the Lahore General Hospital’s accident and emergency department, said that over 50 doctors were working at the department of the 900-bed health institution.

Similarly, over 60 doctors were working at the 100-bed emergency department of the 1,400-bed Jinnah Hospital, according to medical superintendent Dr Afzal Shaheen.

When contacted, SZH administrator Dr Muhammad Akbar told Dawn that facilities at the emergency department of the hospital were extraordinary as compared to any other health institutions in Lahore.

He said two more senior house officers had been posted to the emergency department while a kidney centre room had been converted into ‘dengue ward’ that would function from 2pm to 10pm.