Kolkata: In a unique move, SSKM Hospital has introduced pre-test ward in various departments where all the patients will undergo COVID-19 tests free of cost before being moved to the department for various specialised treatment.
The patients, requiring admission at any department of the SSKM, have to undertake mandatory swab tests. The step has been taken by the SSKM authorities to ensure that patients with suspected symptoms do not sneak into the departments and infect others with the deadly virus.
The patients whom the doctors recommend for admission at various departments will be taken to the pre-test ward where a swab test would be conducted on them. The patients will be taken care of by the doctors and nursing staff at the pre-test ward.
All the medical and non-medical personnel at the pre-test ward are fully equipped with Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) to prevent any infection. If the swab test report of a particular patient comes negative, he/she will be shifted to the department for the treatment he/she was looking for. If any patient tests positive for the virus, he/she will be taken to any of the
dedicated Covid hospitals in the city.
The doctors, nurses and other health workers who are rendering health services at various outdoor departments of the hospital wear the PPE so that the virus, if existing in any of the patient's body, does not transmit to others. The method that SSKM has adopted is one of the most effective ones to check the infection from spreading and affecting doctors, nurses and health workers, feel health expert Dr N Bhattacharya who is a city-based virologist.
"As our enemy is invisible, it is the duty of the doctors and nurses in the hospitals to attend to patients while being equipped in PPE kits. The doctors and nurses are fighting the battle from the front. If they are affected by the virus in large numbers, it will have a major adverse impact on the health sector. Hence, the SSKM Hospital has taken a right move and other hospitals which are not directly involved in Covid treatment may replicate the same," Dr Bhattacharya said.
It may be mentioned that the SSKM has come up with the idea after a senior doctor in the rank of the head of the department had been infected. Recently, three patients at the Cardiothoracic Vascular Surgery (CTVS) department tested positive for the virus.
"To check Covid infection among doctors, nurses and other health workers of the hospital, a pre-test ward has been opened where patients would undergo swab tests free-of-cost. Patients will be moved to the department after they test negative," Dr Raghunath Misra, Medical Superintendent of the hospital added.