Power breakdowns irk patients at hospital

Rawalpindi: Hundreds of poor patients who visited outpatients and emergency departments of Benazir Bhutto Hospital (BBH) for treatment or to avail diagnostic services had to suffer badly due to repeated electricity power breakdowns on Monday.

The patients staying in indoor patients department and those undergoing surgeries at BBH had also suffered a lot as the Islamabad Electric Supply Company failed in keeping power supply of the hospital smooth from 10:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Monday due to faults appeared on electricity supply lines.

The BBH has electric power generators which cover critical areas of the hospital however shifting power supply from Iesco’s supply lines to generators takes few minutes and during the interval, patients had to suffer due to repeated power breakdowns on Monday, said Medical Superintendent at BBH Dr. Arshad Ali Sabir when contacted by ‘The News’.

He said the power breakdowns at BBH occurred repeatedly due to faults at Iesco’s supply lines and the hospital administration had to shift electric power supply to generators again and again.

He added the Iesco’s staff remained busy in fixing the fault and came up with success in streamlining the power supply to the hospital at around 1:30 p.m. He said in the absence of electric power supply during breakdowns, the critical areas of the hospital including intensive care unit and operation theatres were supplied electricity through generators.

He, however, admitted that the critical areas had to remain without electricity for four to five minutes every time when the power supply was shifted from Iesco’s supply lines to electric power generators. It is important that a number of departments of BBH had to operate without electricity for long intervals Monday morning.

Also a good number of patients requiring facility of X-Ray at the BBH emergency department had to suffer badly because the fluctuation in power supply through power generator might damage tube head of the equipment and hence it did not operate during power breakdowns.