8 beds available; needs lot more

In the dim light of a corridor on the first floor of Dhaka Shishu Hospital, the gloomy face of Mansura looked gloomier.

She was desperately looking for a bed at the hospital's Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) for her one-week-old nephew suffering from severe jaundice and stomach problem, but to no avail.

Her frantic efforts began three days ago at Birdem Hospital where a bed was available at an expense she could not afford. Then she went to Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH) to find all the NICU beds there were occupied.

Meanwhile, doctors at Mitford Hospital, where the infant was born and being treated, released him, saying they lacked the medical support needed for the baby.

“Now I'm in a fix and don't know what to do,” said a frustrated Mansura.

So she left the Shishu hospital with a faint promise from its authorities that they'd call her once a bed was available.

Considered one of the most important treatment facilities, the NICU at the hospital has only eight beds.

“And those presumably remain occupied all the time,” said a female staff, wishing anonymity.

"But recommendation from higher officials may come to your aid,"

she said, without going on any further.

At the hospital, there is a general ICU and a Special Care Baby Unit (SCABU) with 30 beds -- both of which are to provide treatment to older children.

The NICU, on the other hand, is for infants aged not more than one month. It requires sophisticated medical equipment as well as skilled doctors and trained nurses, said health experts.

According to hospital sources, the government-supported hospital has 630 beds at present with 40 percent of them available for the poor free of charge.

Tahmeed Ahmed, director of Centre for Nutrition and Food Security at icddr,b, said, "Newborns are diagnosed with some common deceases such as asphysia or breathing problem and sepsis, a kind of infection."

A significant number of infants die from these two deceases, he said.

Nazrul Islam, whose five-day-old nephew was undergoing treatment at the Shishu Hospital NICU, said that alongside insufficient beds, "the NICU unit also has other problems that need to be addressed."

He alleged that on the evening of October 18, right after he admitted his nephew, there was a blackout for about an hour at the NICU and the adjacent SCABU. In the face of protest from the attendants waiting outside, it was revealed later that the generator ran out of fuel.

Despite repeated requests from them, the staffs did not pay any heed to the matter, leading to a scuffle between some attendants and guards on the ground floor, he added.

Contacted, Manzoor Hussain, director of the Shishu Hospital, denied that there was any blackout at the hospital on October 18.

"During load-shedding we usually switch off the lights but keep necessary equipment running with the support of generator," he said.

It might have prompted the attendants to think there was no electricity, he added.

Manzoor, however, admitted that there was a crisis of beds at the NICU.

“It is a major problem at the hospital now,” he said, adding that due to shortage of beds they could not admit many critically ill infants.

He also refuted that "recommendation from higher official helps get a bed sooner."