BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Saturday said the decentralised patient and bed management system adopted recently through the Ward level War Rooms has streamlined the bed allocation in various hospitals and COVID 19 facilities in the city.
Additional Municipal Commissioner Ashwini Bhide in her tweet said, ‘’ Decentralised patient and bed management system adopted by @mybmc through Ward level War Rooms. All positive identified everyday are proactively contacted, triaged for suitable bed allocation and then shifted to CCC2 (covid care centre where asymptomatic cases are admitted), d Dedicated Covid Health Centre and Dedicated Covid Hospital suitably or kept on home isolation. It has been working well for a week.’’
FPJ broke the story on June 6. The Municipal Commissioner Iqbal Chahal ordered the setting up of Ward War Room in all 24 wards to decentralise bed management, handling of positive cases and redressal of grievances. As per BMC's order, beds for COVID-19 patients can be booked at ward level, as the BMC will set up helplines at all 24 wards where bed allocation will be done. The BMC’s helpline (1916) will divert all calls to individual wards.
BMC Officer, who is associated with this initiative, confirmed that experience has been quite good so far. ‘’May patients are getting accommodated at the ward level hospitals or CCC2s first. Those who need not get to hospitals are being advised for home isolation. So pressure on Central helpline and blind hunting for hospitals have gone down slightly. However, we need to observe for a couple of more weeks to draw inferences,’’ he noted.
He further said that the BMC ward wise helpline is very helpful. ‘’It is a centralised decision making but decentralisation of the powers does the trick,’’ he opined.
According to the decentralised patient and bed management system, "each Ward Control Room shall have 30 telephone lines in the backend of Ward War Room telephone number." BMC has directed Assistant Commissioners to make sure uninterrupted functioning of these telephone lines.
This Ward War Room activity has been supervised by a Senior Resident Doctor. All doctors including Senior Resident Doctor have been provided by Director, Medical Education & Research, Maharashtra State.
