Citizens demanded on Sunday the concerned authorities to immediately start full-fledged evening shift at Out Patient Department (OPD) of Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), keeping in view the large number of patients during morning time. They said due to heavy load at OPD in daytime and limited hospital timing, several patients who visited the hospital from far-flung areas of the country faced several problems and failed to get consultation from the doctors. They also complained of inadequate staff at PIMS emergency and its OPD and appealed to deploy sufficient staff including medical and paramedical staff at the emergency ward and OPD for delivery of better services to the patients. Over 4,000 patients visited PIMS OPD daily for treatment of various health problems, adding that out of the total patients, 75 percent were on follow up visits while 25 percent new patients came to the hospital’s OPD, an official of PIMS said. He said seven to eight member teams of doctors performed duties in the hospital’s OPDs, including medical officers, professors, assistant professors and post graduates while in filter clinics had two to three member teams of doctors. He said around 800 to 900 patients also visited the hospital’s emergency ward, including 400 in main emergency while others visited children emergency wards, burn hospital emergency and mother and child emergency unit. He said five to six community medical officers remained on duty in each emergency ward where 80 percent patients visited with minor diseases like cough or headache while only 20 percent patients were admitted in the ward with serious conditions like head injury and heart attack. He said the hospital had been established with an aim to provide special health services to the patients with critical diseases however, now the hospital had become a major centre for all patients who visited came there from various parts of the country.
