The restoration of the State-run K.R. Hospital and Cheluvamba Hospital, the city’s major public healthcare centres that were in the forefront of the COVID-19 battle, largely hinges on when the trauma care centre and the yet-to-be-launched Super Speciality Hospital on KRS Road become operational.
Thanks to the roll out of vaccine for COVID-19 and infection rate flattening to a considerable extent, the focus is now being shifted to equipping hospitals with facilities for non-COVID-19 services.
The 120-bed Trauma Care Center was inaugurated almost two years ago and the super speciality hospital is ready for the inauguration. Both the facilities have come up on the PKTB Sanatorium campus.
Though the trauma care centre that was lying unoccupied for want of equipment and manpower was hurriedly readied when the pandemic was at its peak last year, the facility did not handle COVID-19 as the cases started dropping substantially and the designated COVID-19 Hospital managed the cases on its own.
If the pressure on K.R. Hospital has to be eased, major departments from it have to move to the new hospitals. This can happen only when the two get required manpower and equipment as per the NMC and NABH guidelines.
With the UG intake in Mysore Medical College and Research Institute going up from 150 to 250, the operation of new facilities has become imminent.
The building of the super speciality hospital is ready but it too mainly needs equipment and manpower soon so that the purpose for which it was set up would be fulfilled, providing super speciality healthcare services.
Sources in the MMCRI said funds had been sought in the budget for 2021-22 for making the trauma care centre and the super speciality hospital functional.
At least eight departments from K.R. Hospital will move out of its existing premises if the super speciality hospital becomes fully ready for attending to the patients. Orthopaedic, emergency and related departments can be shifted to the trauma care centre if it becomes fully operational.
The Mysore Medical College and Research Institute (MMCRI) has submitted its proposals to its parent department on the necessities of the new hospitals. It is now keeping its fingers crossed and awaiting special allocation in the budget so that it could take up renovation of K.R. Hospital, shifting in-patient and out-patient services to the new facilities.
The 220-bed super speciality hospital is estimated to have been built at a cost of ₹134 crore. When Siddaramaiah was the Chief Minister, he had allocated ₹123.77 crore for civil works of the eight-storey building and ₹37.25 crore for the purchase of medical equipment. The allocation was described as the highest for a super-speciality hospital under the government set-up.
The super speciality hospital was earlier planned on the premises of K.R. Hospital. But, on knowing that the tall structure may not get approval from the State heritage authorities with K.R. Hospital being a heritage structure, the project was shifted to PKTB Sanatorium premises, which has over 120 acres of land under the control of the Directorate of Medical Education.
The super-speciality hospital has a built area of 2,20,676.84 sq ft with each floor having over 40,000 sq ft of space to accommodate the departments and other facilities.
Nearly a dozen departments, including neurology, neuro surgery, medical gastroenterology, surgical gastroenterology, plastic surgery, paediatric surgery, medical oncology, surgical oncology, radiation oncology, and other departments from K.R. Hospital would be shifted to the super speciality hospital after it becomes fully ready to handle the patients.
