Doctors to Take Final Call on Admission, Discharge of COVID-19 Patients, Says West Bengal Clinical Establishment Regulatory Commission

Kolkata, August 3: Aiming to free up private hospital beds for COVID-19 patients requiring emergency treatment, the West Bengal Clinical Establishment Regulatory Commission in an advisory said that only the doctor will decide on admission or discharge. The decision of the examining doctor taken without any extraneous consideration or recommendation will be deemed final, it said.

If the number of waiting patients is more than the number of vacant beds, the doctor on duty would examine each patient and allot beds to the most deserving ones ignoring any extraneous considerations or recommendations. The decision of the doctor on duty will be final and binding upon all, said an advisory from the Commission. India’s COVID-19 Tally Crosses 18 Lakh Mark With 52,972 New Cases in Past 24 Hours, Death Toll Mounts to 38,135.

The examining doctor will also take the final call on shifting a patient from the general bed to the ICU or ITU, the advisory stated. We have noticed that patients refuse to go home without a confirmatory coronavirus negative report though the discharge guidelines state that clinically fit patient can now be sent home even without testing negative.

Following this we have decided on this new advisory so that patients who need to be hospitalised do not have to wait as they do get any vacancies, one member of the Commission said.

If the patient wants he/she can shift to a safe house after being discharged from the hospital but will not be allowed to occupy a bed pending a negative COVID-19 report, he said.

In West Bengal there are 55 private hospitals so far treating COVID-9 patients. With 37.88 per cent occupancy there are at the moment 11,552 beds for patients of the pandemic in West Bengal.