E-Paper
Doctors in Pune work as counsellors to help patients fight quarantine stress
With cases of Covid-19 patients running away or trying to escape quarantine facility, counselling of patients is becoming as crucial as medical treatment
Pune: Patients inside the quarantine facility are fighting two enemies — coronavirus and forced isolation. They have been locked away from routine life from the past few days. With their mobile phones as their only source of information and entertainment, their only human connect is the few people who visit the medical centre the treatment and the staff.
With cases of Covid-19 patients running away or trying to escape quarantine facility, counselling of patients is becoming as crucial as medical treatment. Dr Avinash Bhondwe, state president, Indian Medical Association (IMA) emphasised that counselling is paramount in these times of stress.
He said, “Since these patients are still using their phones, they are susceptible to fake information too. Even before the patients are taken in they must be explained as what quarantine means exactly, how much time they might have to stay inside and what kind of treatment would they be given? This is not being done at government hospital, but for obvious reasons that the government hospital doctors are also stressed due to the sudden crisis. Quarantine may especially feel like house arrest. The most difficult time is the waiting period when the patient is yet to get the test result which is when they need most counselling. It may be even difficult for people who are claustrophobic or face anxiety issues to live in quarantine facility.”
Although Rajesh Tope, state health minister, had announced that patients would be provided various sources of entertainment, including board games like carrom board, the district administration is yet to take a call on the same. Naval Kishore Ram, Pune collector, said, “We will definitely take a positive decision on the same.”
On Monday, a Covid-19 positive patient tried to flee from the civic-run Yashwantrao Chavan Memorial (YCM) hospital at Pimpri-Chinchwad before he was caught by authorities and brought back to the quarantine.
Dr Sudhir Patsute, medical superintendent, Naidu Hospital, said, “We do not provide any separate counsellors for the Covid-19 patients because we do not want to put more people to the risk of exposure. We have a minimum dedicated staff, which attends to all the needs of these patients and while providing treatment we also take care of their psychological needs. Proper personal communication is being done by our nurses too and women are the best counsellors as they are easier to communicate with.”
One of the patients in quarantine at Naidu Hospital said, “Doctors visit us three times in a day and provide us all the necessary information. The sanitation is quite up to the mark.”
In a report published by medical journal The Lancet, in February 2020 it conducted various studies to assess the psychological impact of quarantine. It states that people quarantined because of being in close contact with those who potentially have SARS25 (severe acute respiratory syndrome) reported various negative responses during the quarantine period, over 20% (230 of 1,057) reported fear, 18% (187) reported nervousness, 18% (186) reported sadness and 10% (101) reported guilt. Few reported positive feelings: 5% (48) reported feelings of happiness and 4% (43) reported feelings of relief. Qualitative studies also identified a range of other psychological responses to quarantine such as confusion, fear, anger, grief, numbness and anxiety-induced insomnia.
AFMC to start testing Covid-19 swab samples
Armed Forces Medical College (AFMC) in Pune will soon start testing swab samples for Covid-19 (coronavirus). Commandar Vijay Bhaskar, public relations officer, AFMC confirmed the development and said that the institute is yet to receive guidelines from the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). He said, “The lab is ready and we can start testing for Covid-19 from Tuesday. It would be a dedicated lab for coronavirus and we will start functioning as soon as we get the guidelines.”
The government is presently collecting swab samples only if the person has come in direct contact with any of the Covid-19 positive case or if anyone has returned from any of the ten “high risk” countries, namely China, Italy, Iran, South Korea, Germany, Spain, France, Dubai, the US and Saudi Arabia, and shows symptoms. However, with increasing cases, the government may widen the criteria for swab collection. To reduce the load on government hospitals, the government is looking to increase the number of ICMR’s Virus Research & Diagnostic Laboratories (VRDLs), one of which is Pune’s AFMC.
