PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa health department has planned to upgrade and expand trauma services in the province to minimise loss of human lives from manmade and natural calamities.

The relevant officials told Dawn on Saturday that doctors had noted that majority of the people developed complications in the aftermath of earthquake, floods and bomb attacks as they didn’t receive the required emergency care.

They said patients were transported to tertiary care hospitals in Peshawar as district health centres had proper facilities.

The officials said despite presence of human resources, equipment and medicines, the emergency care being provided at local hospitals were not up to the mark.

They said the province was prone to calamities and that the latest example of it was the Oct 26 earthquake, which caused injuries to more than 2,000 people, mostly in Malakand, but ironically around 500 injured people were shifted to hospitals of other areas due to poor emergency care in the respective districts.

The officials said following every emergency, the accident and emergency department (A&ED) of the Lady Reading Hospital Peshawar received critically injured people from all districts despite the presence of specialist physicians, surgeons and orthopedics there (districts).

They said the health department had tasked Dr Tahir Shah, a general surgeon working as a consultant surgeon in Saudi Arabia, with making a plan to strengthen trauma services in the province.

The officials said the consultant had been working on a plan to upgrade trauma services at LRH and begin series of training for doctors, nurses and paramedics to improve techniques in handling medical emergencies.

Dr Shah, a volunteer member of the LRH board of governors, told Dawn that there was a dire need to improve and spread network of emergency services to enable health workers to carry out lifesaving procedures in all district headquarters hospitals and rural health centres.

He said the calamities caused traumatic injuries, which could be handled by trained health workers more effectively.

The BoG member said the prompt medical aid to serious patients helped save their lives and prevent disabilities.

He said the A&ED LRH had been receiving most of the people affected by calamities and terrorist attacks and thus increasing workload on its staff, which at times adversely affected their overall performance.

“Referring patients from far-fling areas to Peshawar also aggravates their health. The people with spine or other serious injuries can’t be moved to remote areas,” he said.

Dr Shah said he had already submitted a proposal to the LRH BoG to upgrade the advanced trauma life support services to offer diplomas and degrees to health workers.

He said the emergency services department would be established at the hospital, which would not only give essential health services to patients needing urgent assistance but also produce specialists in trauma to be later posted to healthcare facilities in districts.

The BoG member said with the availability of trained staff, the district hospitals would efficiently attend to emergency patients.

He said the scaling up of awareness of development of first-aid skill was at the core of the programme to minimise losses and risk of disabilities.

Published in Dawn, November 1st, 2015

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