Nagpur: Technical glitch of the Arterial Blood Gases (ABG) machinery, unavailability of reagents and kits to carry out Liver and Kidney tests have left the patients visiting at Indira Gandhi Medical College and Hospital (IGGMCH) commonly known as Mayo Hospital in utter inconvenience as they are forced to take tests in private healthcare centers at much higher costs.
The mandatory tests, need for referring medicines are not being conducted at Mayo Hospital, as the hospital does not have the reagents, essential for the most of the investigations. Also the ABG machines are dysfunctional owing to technical glitch.
ABG test costs nearly Rs 1000 for a single time. Thus, it leaves no option for the patients but to pay Rs 2,000 each day for this test while, the same test should be done for free at the lab in Mayo.
It may be noted that various kinds of analysis have to be done for any ICU, or patients on ventilator, one such investigation is ABG, the very basic/ test mandatory two times a day. The scenario is same in all the four ICUs. Since couple of months, ABG test is not being done at the lab in Mayo, instead the doctors have to send the sample to outside lab.
According to a source, ABG test is basically a blood test which measures the pH, and the levels of oxygen (O2) and carbon dioxide (CO2) from an artery. This ultimately helps to check the function of the patient’s lungs and how well they are able to move oxygen and remove carbon dioxide. It is performed twice a day. Because ABG is the most precise representation of a patient’s clinical status, it can lead to quicker and more accurate changes in the plan of care. Without knowing Ph of the body, the further treatment will be difficult to guide.
When Nagpur Today took matter to Dr Ajay Keoliya, Dean, IGGMC he said that, “I’ve acknowledged the irregularities reported within the hospital. ABG machine is stationary at Medical Intensive Care Unit (MICU) 4. First we anticipated that it was technical glitch however, when it came to the fore that a part of the machinery needs to replace, we have placed an order regarding the same. Though we will surely sort out the irregularity soon.”
“As far as Liver/ Kidney function tests are concerned, the kits are not available with us due to which we are unable to report investigations for a few enzymes. We have ordered the new kits which will take another one week to come.”
By Shubham Nagdeve
