Africa-Press – Uganda. Doctors have said for Covid-19 patients to get admission, they must be referred from a hospital or they must have been evacuated from home by the Ministry of Health team.
“Covid-19 patients who need admission in Intensive Care Unit (ICU) but were already admitted in some hospitals are referred by the doctor from that hospital to a facility that offers intensive care services,” Dr Moses Muwanga, the executive director of Entebbe Regional Referral Hospital, said.
Consultation
The deputy director of Mulago hospital, Dr Rosemary Byanyima, said to avoid frustrations, a successful referral involves prior consultation and confirmation of available bed in the ICU or High Dependency Unit (HDU) in the care centre of destination.
“If you have severe critical disease, normally you are brought by a team from Ministry of Health who have the ambulance to transport the patient to hospital,” Dr Byanyima said.
“The operators of the ambulance always call us to confirm whether there is available bed for the patient and if there is no bed, we advise them what to do,” she said.
Previous narratives by relatives of some Covid-19 patients whom this newspaper interviewed showed that some patients were turned away at various hospitals and others died because the hospitals did not have the beds for admission.
Those at home
Dr Muwanga said Covid-19 patients who are undergoing home-based care but need immediate admission in hospital after developing severe conditions can be brought directly to the hospital.He did not specify whether one needs to first confirm with the hospital whether there is an available bed.
However, according to the ministry’s guidelines for Covid-19 patients undergoing home-based care, a patient or their caretaker can call the Ministry’s toll-free number 0800100066 or 0800203033 to be evacuated to hospital if their conditions deteriorate. “We admit severe to critical cases. The moderate cases we admit are those who have risk factors [such as diabetes, hypertension or old age],” she said.Another health worker at the admission desk of the treatment unit at Mulago hospital, who declined to be named, said a new patient coming for admission must have “positive test results for Covid-19 or chest CT scan.”
“Chest CT scanning in patients with Covid-19 symptoms are the alternative ways to determine whether the person has the disease or not,” the health worker said.
At Victoria Hospital in Kampala, the officer at the reception said for a Covid-19 patient in critical condition has to deposit Shs10m before admission.
