Don't worry about him....Soon he will be promoted to "Analyst/Think Tank"
Ward woes: In Rawalpindi hospitals, everything is at own risk
By
Fawad Ali /
Photo: Zafar Aslam
Published: June 5, 2014
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Patients and attendants wait in outside in the lawn due to the boiling-hot waiting rooms. PHOTO: ZAFAR ASLAM/ EXPRESS
RAWALPINDI:
Barriers at main entrances, unreasonably high parking fees and cramped waiting lounges have compounded the problems of patients and visitors to the allied hospitals.
Contractors have been awarded parking contracts charging the motorists at will. They charge Rs10 per hour for a motorcycle and Rs30 for a car, yet the receipt still reads, ‘Parking at your own risk’.
Visitors from other cities such as Chakwal, Attock, or Azad Jammu and Kashmir also complained about being overcharged parking fees.
“My mother has been admitted here for a week and I had to pay Rs1,000 as car parking fee to the contractor at the District Headquarters (DHQ) Hospital,” said Wahid Saeed.
“We have paid Rs5.7 million to get the contract. We also have to pay our staff,” said Altaf, who collects parking fees at the main gate of DHQ hospital.
Parking conditions at Benazir Bhutto Hospital (BBH) are even worse.
Bikes and cars are left in no-parking areas to avoid paying parking fees, making it difficult for patients, especially those with limited physical mobility, to even enter the hospital.
As a result of this, scuffles between visitors and parking contractors are a common sight at BBH.
“Why should I pay the fee if I have to park my motorcycle at my own risk,” a visitor wrangled with a contractor when he saw the receipt handed to him at the gate.
Blocked entrances
Barriers placed at the entrances to the three main public hospitals — DHQ, BBH and Holy Family Hospital — to regulate the traffic have also created difficulties for walk-in patients who must duck and weave their way in.
Besides, the doorways of various wards are blocked with chains, which are opened only in an emergency. Patients, including the elderly and women, have to either cross over the chains or go through the narrow space on one side.
The pain of waiting
According to figures provided by the hospital administrations, around 4,000 people visit the three hospitals every day.
Unfortunately, waiting lounges in the hospitals, which already have limited seating, also lack fans and clean drinking water. Most of the water coolers installed at the hospitals are in poor shape and visitors are forced to purchase bottled water.
When asked about the parking fee, the DHQ medical superintendent said he can only comment after reading the contract and hung up. BBH MS Asif Qadir Mir was not available for comment
Published in The Express Tribune, June 5th, 2014.
