Patient care services will be fully functional by Monday: AIIMS

The emergency department, from where patients had to be moved Saturday evening because of the smoke from the fire, started admitting patients for treatment from Sunday morning.

Thirty-six hours after a major fire gutted several rooms across four floors in the teaching block of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) on Saturday evening, out-patient clinics, emergency and ward services will function “normally” on Monday.

Firefighters at the site of a major fire that broke out in the 2nd floor of the PC block near the emergency ward at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). (Sanjeev Verma/HT PHOTO)

“Director AIIMS held a meeting with the heads of all departments and administrative staff to review patient care services. The outpatient department and emergency services will continue to run normally. Operation theatres will be functional and the scheduled surgeries will be performed,” said AIIMS in a statement.

The emergency department, from where patients had to be moved Saturday evening because of the smoke from the fire, started admitting patients for treatment from Sunday morning.

“About 34 patients had to be moved from the hospital’s emergency department and the AB ward above because of the smoke. They were moved back to the wards late last night and early morning today after the fire was completely doused. The Emergency department started seeing patients from the morning,” said a hospital official, on condition of anonymity.

Sabina Bi, whose 23-year-old son has been receiving treatment at the hospital for stomach cancer, came to the hospital emergency on Sunday afternoon when he started experiencing excruciating pain. “The doctors have started treating him. There was no problem. I did hear about the fire yesterday,” she said.

The fire had started on Saturday evening at the microbiology department on the second floor of the teaching block at AIIMS. The entire department, including stored research work, was gutted.

This will likely affect the laboratory services at the hospital for a couple of days.

“The hospital cannot return to a 100% in just a day after such a massive fire of course. But our focus is patient care and we will ensure that the services run as smoothly as possible. Whatever was lost yesterday was lost. In the meantime, we are trying to make alternate arrangements for various departments to operate out of. Even the equipment of the microbiology department will be moved so that the patient care activities can take place,” said Dr DK Sharma, medical superintendent of the hospital.

The lab services will be moved to the convergence block next to the director’s office within a few days, according to a hospital official.

The second floor sustained the maximum damage. “On the other floors only a couple of rooms were damaged. Most of these were department offices or the offices of the faculty members,” said the official.

“It will take at least a few months to repair the damage,” said Dr Sharma.

“A committe has been set up to restore the full functionality of services affected in the teaching block. Additional staff has also been deployed for guiding the patients. The meeting also discussed existing fire safety arrangements at AIIMS and steps needed to further strengthen it,” the hospital statement said.