CHANDIGARH: The Bharat bandh on the first day of the OPD in PGI reduced the much expected footfall. There were 3,942 registrations during physical OPDs while the remaining were through tele-consultation. There were 5,288 registrations in total, which was almost the same as those during tele-consultations.
“Due to the farmers’ Bharat Bandh call, there were not many patients from Himachal Pradesh, Punjab and Haryana. But over a few days, we expect the number to cross 6,000,” said PGI director Prof Jagat Ram.
As the registration counters opened, patients who had queued up an hour before were mostly masked. Waiting halls and holding areas were crowded but as patients’ names were called, there was social distancing inside doctors’ rooms.
“The physical OPDs have been resumed after more than one and a half years and as doctors we are satisfied to see patients. Hopefully, if Covid appropriate behaviour is followed, we might return to normalcy,” said the director. The situation will be reviewed after two weeks and a final call will be taken on physical OPDs.
On any day, PGI had been seeing more than 10,000 patients in OPDs daily during pre-Covid times. For resumption of physical OPDs, routine registration time was reduced from three hours to one hour and 45 minutes. “We had been trying to register online for a month. But now I have come here and it took me an hour to get registration. At least, I could consult the doctor the same day,” said Arzoo Chhabra, a city resident.
Most people had been waiting for the OPDs to reopen as they were unable to afford private care. “I had been going to private clinics for my gall bladder stone problem but I was not confident about getting myself operated there. Today, I got my card made to consult the PGI surgeon. It took me more than an hour to see the doctor,” said Navdeep Sethi, a patient from Mohali.
