Hospitals see sharp fall in admissions: Lack of trust, COVID-19 infection fear, mismanagement blamed

Most of the COVID-19 hospital beds and almost half the non-COVID beds still remain vacant while all the government offices have, meanwhile, reopened and transports have resumed operation fully.

The number of patients at the outpatient departments has fallen by 75 to 90 per cent at places.

Health rights activists and health care system insiders identified people’s fear of COVID-19 infection in hospitals and transports, their lack of confidence in treatment at hospitals and hospitals’ mismanagement in treating patients amid the COVID-19 crisis and exposure of corruption in the health sector as reasons for the fall in numbers.

After the COVID-19 outbreak, it was exposed that patients did not get admission to hospitals though they ran from one facility to another as they did not have COVID-19 negative certificates which is still difficult for the patients to obtain.

They said that only the patients with serious illnesses were visiting hospitals.

Some patients, especially those with cardiac complications, kidney problems and cancers that need frequent follow-up treatment, said that hospitals discouraged them from being admitted on different excuses, including asking for COVID-19 negative certificates.

All the requirements they mentioned are time-consuming, costly and difficult to fulfil, they said.

Many patients did not get proper treatment due to COVID-19 while many were afraid of going to hospitals for fear of catching the infection, health minister Zahid Maleque said on Thursday while talking to reporters at the Secretariat.

‘As the COVID-19 situation is improving, we are planning to declare some hospitals for the treatment of non-COVID diseases by the end of this month,’ he added.

The new director general of health services, Abul Bashar Mohammad Khurshid Alam, on July 25 said that he was trying to overcome the problems that the health sector was facing.

Khurshid was made the DG after Abul Kalam Azad resigned from the post, reportedly over a row involving corruption and mismanagement in the health care system.

‘Patients in both our inpatient and outpatient departments have fallen by 50 per cent. About 400 patients are now admitted to our hospital while 350 to 400 patients are taking treatment at the outpatient department,’ National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases director Professor Mir Jamal Uddin told New Age.

‘The situation arose out of transport problems and COVID-19 lockdowns. We are admitting all the patients who are coming,’ he said, hoping that the number would increase with the improvement in the situation.

A total of 747 patients took treatment at the Dhaka Medical College Hospital OPD on Thursday, 1,162 on Tuesday, 876 on Monday and 850 on Sunday while the number was around 3,500 before the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, officials said.

A total of 114 patients were admitted to the hospital on Wednesday, 94 on Tuesday, 100 on Monday, 130 on Sunday and 91 on Saturday though around 450 patients used to be admitted to the facility before the pandemic, when the authorities had to arrange extra beds on the hospital floor, they said.

They said that there was no bed on the floor of the hospital on Wednesday and six patients were being treated against the 16 beds at the thoracic surgery department, seven patients against the 16 beds at the urology department, 14 patients at the 24-bed orthopaedic department.

Many doctors, too, kept their private chambers closed and were not seeing patients.

The afternoon’s specialist consultation at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University has remained closed since days after COVID-19 broke out in the country.

Swasthya Andolan co-convenor Farida Akhter said that the drop in the number of patients at hospitals was an outcome of people’s loss of trust in them after the recent revelation of corruption incidents in the healthcare system, including the JKG Health Care and Regent Hospital scams, while many patients experienced harassment and almost no treatment since the COVID-19 outbreak.

‘The situation demonstrates that the country’s healthcare system has collapsed,’ she said.

The facts of JKG Health Care and Regent Hospital dishing out fake COVID-19 test reports without testing samples at all were unearthed early July.

On Friday, 4,576 COVID-19 patients were taking treatment at hospitals, including 314 in ICUs, while1,07,091 were taking treatment at home. The country has 15,258 normal and 539 ICU beds dedicated to COVID-19 treatment.

At Khulna Medical College Hospital in Khulna city, about 1,200 patients were admitted before the COVID-19 pandemic but now about 700 patients are admitted, said the hospital’s statistics officer Rezwan ul Raj.

He said that about 300 patients took treatment at the hospital’s OPD each day now though the number was about 3,000 a day before the coronavirus infection was reported.

Mehedi Hasan, a patient from Kotalipara in Gopalganj now staying at the capital’s Moghbazar, is taking treatment at the internal medicine department of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University’s OPD.

He said that he was compelled to come to the hospital as he had been suffering from frequent Diarrhoea for the past three weeks and as his condition did not improve after taking treatment through telemedicine.

Sadia Afrin, a resident of the capital’s Mohammadpur, said that she took treatment online after her hand burnt when she was cooking a week ago because she thought that it was not safe to go out amid the coronavirus prevalence.

Nabirul Islam, a patient at the capital’s Rampura who suffered a mild stroke last month, said that he, referred by a doctor of a private hospital for angiogram, went to the NICVD where doctors sought from him COVID-19 test report before admitting him.

‘The private doctor I visited is actually a doctor from the NICVD and I came to know that COVID-19 test is available at the NICVD only for their staff. It took me about two weeks after that time to give my sample, on the recommendation of the doctor, and get the report,’ he said.

‘From the comments passed by the doctor and staff at the NICVD, I felt that they were discouraging me from getting admitted there,’ he said, adding that he tried to consult a senior doctor there but failed.

‘Later, I went to a private hospital for consulting a senior cardiologist from BSMMU but they told me that he was not seeing any patient now,’ he said, adding that he finally managed to consult a senior doctor online.

Bangladesh Health Rights Movement chairman Rashid-e-Mahbub said that while the risk of contracting coronavirus at hospitals could not be ruled out there existed lack of proper planning and management of patients and hospitals.

Unlike in other countries, patients in Bangladesh, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, are scared of contracting COVID-19 at hospitals and even many were deprived of proper treatment at hospitals when they approached those due the lack of planning and management.

‘We can’t rule out the risks of contracting COVID-19, but the isolation measures, separation of blocks, entry to and exit from hospitals would make treatment smooth and patients would not be afraid of going to hospitals,’ said Rashid, also a former pro vice-chancellor of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University.

‘We should take measures to mitigate the fear with proper planning for and management of both coronavirus and other patients as well as the health facilities with a proper approach,’ he concluded.