HYDERABAD: A meeting has decided to expedite the hiring process of nursing/intensive care unit (ICU) staf f to strengthen the ICU for Covid-19 patients at the Liaquat University Hospital (LUH).

The meeting was held on Monday night presided over by Hyderabad Deputy Commissioner Fuad Ghaffar Soomro in the medical superintendent (MS) office and attended by LUH MS Syed Zawar Shah, Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences Provice Chancellor Prof Dr Ikramuddin Ujjan, District Health Officer Dr Lala Jaffar and department of anaesthesiology chairman and ICU head Prof Hamid Raza and others.

The meeting was held in the backdrop of Prof Raza`s letter to the hospital MS about non-functional ventilators in the Covid-19 ICU. He had raised someof important issues in his July 10 communication about functioning of the ICU.

It decided to bring about major changes in the ICU as well as high dependency unit of the hospital. It also resolved to shift 12 new ventilators from the existing pool of 32 to three ICUs of the LUH Hyderabad and Jamshoro branches. It was decided that 10 new continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) and bilevel positive airway pressure (BiPAP) machines with good quality face masks would be urgently provided in the Covid-19 ICU.

It was also decided that the matter of joining of the remaining 15 anaesthetists would be taken up with the relevant authorities so that the ICU could be managed properly during the pandemic; trained ICU technicians from the existing pool would replace the anaesthesiatechniciansintheCovid-19 ICU because they could not handle invasive and non-invasive ventilation.It resolved that repair of obsolete ventilators was not a practical solution.

Prof Hamid Raza suggested direct communication/cooperation between the hospital MS and department of anaesthesia, LUMHS.

It is also learnt that the DC was critical of the fact that why the nurses and technicians whose interviews had been conducted in the tenure of the outgoing MS were not hired. He wondered what the administration was doing since then when the hospital administration had funds and permission for hiring staf f on temporary basis for 89 days.

He called for hiring them immediately so that proper healthcare of patients could be ensured.

It is learnt that the newly appointed MS shared some of his problems as far as hospital`s administration was concerned. The meeting decided to expedite process for strengthening of the Covid-19 ICU.