Chandigarh: Nehru Hospital OTs shut again

The OTs were made functional after 48 hrs of the fire incident, but were shut down again due to heating of batteries

The operation theatres (OTs) shut after major fire incident at the Nehru Hospital in Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research in Chandigarh were made functional after 48 hours. However, after few surgeries, these OTs had to be temporarily closed for another 24 hours.

The battery room, near the dialysis unit, where the fire had originated, has now been sealed. (ht photo)

After major fire on late Monday night in the computer battery room of Block-C in Nehru Hospital many services were suspended including elective surgeries. On Thursday around 90% of the affected services were restored in the building.

The OTs were operational for elective surgeries, but were closed for the next 24 hours after heating issues in the batteries, as confirmed by Dr Vipin Kaushal, the medical superintendent of PGI. Some staff members also reported sparking and minor fire, however no official confirmation was received on it.

As per Kaushal, bone marrow transplants in C-Block have resumed, the hospital is addressing the oxygen supply issue after the fire incident, maternity services in B-block are operational, and the Clean Labour Room (CLR) is functioning in maternity wing and Septic Labour Room (SLR) is yet to be started.

Fact finding committee yet to submit report

A committee of 14 members, led by acting dean of academics, Naresh Panda, was constituted to investigate the major fire incident and was asked to submit its report to the director of PGI within 48 hours. However, the committee failed to submit the report by Thursday, surpassing the designated time frame.

An official statement released PGIMER said, “As we all know that a committee has been constituted to ascertain the exact cause and work out an action plan to avoid any such occurrence. However, considering the mammoth amount of work, the committee is still working on it and the report has not been submitted to the authorities as yet, so any information available in this regard is not validated by PGIMER authorities.”

Thursday witnessed the convening of two meetings – one with the fact-finding committee and the other with the financial committee responsible for evaluating the extent of damage to machinery and other losses. The authorities are presently in the process of quantifying the financial losses incurred due to the fire. The fact-finding report is expected to be submitted by Friday afternoon.

On Monday, late night major fire broke in Nehru Hospital building and 424 patients were evacuated.