PGI starts one-stop counter
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, January 22
For specialised tests, patients at the PGIMER here no longer need to visit eight individual departments in the research block. A single window for all formalities, including fee submission, sample collection and obtaining reports, has been made operational on a trial basis.
The window has been set up at the research block A (located opposite the emergency unit), that houses 8 departments, including medical parasitology, microbiology, pathology, cytology, histopathology, virology, immunopathology and biochemistry.
Earlier, the patients were forced to visit each department separately for tests at the Research Block A and B for giving samples after submitting fee at counters located in separate buildings.
In addition to consolidating services under one roof, the counter will also remain open for longer hours (9am to 4.30pm) than the existing counters. At present, there are three separate counters for each formality — fee submission, sample collection and later obtaining report. Not only are these located far away from each other but also have different operational hours causing inconvenience to patients.
While the fee counter — located at the fourth floor, new OPD block — remains open from 9am to 4pm, the sample collection centre at the ground floor, new OPD block, is accessible to patients from 9am to 12.30pm. The report collection counter, located at the ground floor in the new OPD block, functions from 9am to 4pm. For admitted patients (across various departments in the Nehru hospital or advanced care centres, emergency and trauma centre), attendants submit fee at fee Counter No 16 in Nehru hospital and then carry vials of blood sample for deposition at the research block.
