PGIMER plans infectious disease hospital at Sarangpur

The hospital is expected to have a high-level isolation unit which will be equipped to deal with infectious disease outbreaks.

Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER) is planning to build a 200-bed infectious diseases hospital on the newly acquired land in Sarangpur here.

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Officials at the institute who are working on the project said several pandemics had time and again stressed the healthcare system, and there was a need to have a separate facility to manage patients suffering from contagious diseases.

The hospital is expected to have a high-level isolation unit which will be equipped to deal with infectious disease outbreaks.

PGIMER director Dr Jagat Ram said such facilities do not exist in many hospitals, especially in resource-limited settings. “If we have learnt anything from Covid-19 it is to have a hospital which is always prepared for such emergencies. There are special requirements for such hospitals such as maintaining negative pressure in the buildings, which is generally not the case, and a trained workforce,” Dr Ram said.

He added that the institute had expressed their desire to the central government and had received a positive response. “We have started working on the project and we will take it through various high-level bodies of the institute.”

The PGIMER had converted a general building into an infectious disease hospital after the UT administration had requested for the same. The Nehru Hospital Extension Block that was prepared to deal with the pandemic has now treated close to 900 Covid-19 patients from across the region.