TAXILA: The paucity of staff and lack of facilities at Tehsil Headquarters (THQ) Hospital Hassanabdal annoyed the chairman of Chief Minister’s Complaint Cell district Rawalpindi incharge Akbar Khan Tanoli during a visit to the hospital on Sunday.

Mr Tanoli, on public complaints, paid a snap visit to the hospital where patients and their attendants piled up complaints, especially about unavailability of surgeons, rude behaviour of staff and the outdated X-ray machine.

The patients and their attendants also complained about inadequate facilities and paucity of staff.

Waqar Ali, a notable of the area, informed Mr Tanoli that the seat of surgeon in the hospital had been vacant for long and patients especially road accident victims were shifted to Rawalpindi.

Due to the unavailability of the surgeon, C-section has not been carried out in the hospital which also endangers lives of women and infants.

Shahid Khan, another resident of the area, informed him that the seat of blood officer was also vacant in the hospital for long which results in dysfunctional of blood bank of the hospital established to cater to the city and adjacent 41 villages.

Kiran Bibi, a patient, said the X-ray machine of the hospital is obsolete which does not provide good results and there is a dire need of digital machine.

Mr Tanoli told newsmen that provision of better health facilities to patients was the top priority of the PTI government.

“Successive governments in the past only preferred to provide better healthcare facilities to the rich while ignoring poor patients. However, we are implementing an integrated roadmap to provide equal healthcare facilities to the rich and the poor,” he said.

Published in Dawn, August 17th, 2020