Gurugram: The district health department is planning to introduce a centralised token system at the Civil Hospital in Sector 10A to curb queues at the out-patient departments (OPDs) and reduce waiting times for patients, officials aware of the matter said on Thursday.
A tender was floated in this regard to install 26 LED-touch display panels for token information and announcements, along with incorporating the token system, officials said.
“The existing token system in the hospital will be upgraded through comparatively large touch panels with offline/reporting history of patients to be recorded for interactive patient navigation and reduce waiting time outside the OPDs,” a senior Public Works Department (PWD) official said, requesting anonymity.
As per the tender document available on the Haryana government’s website, bids will be accepted till May 27, following which a technical evaluation will be done. The tender floated by the PWD on Wednesday includes mounting live token display units outside the hospital’s 20 OPDs, along with “keypad caller” systems, digital signage media players and a centralised token-management software for real-time display of OPD queue status and public information.
Officials said the new token system is likely to be implemented within seven months. It is expected to improve coordination among different OPDs and patient-care booths. Currently, patients struggle to seek timely treatment due to multiple referrals for each diagnosis and treatment. The issue of non-functional tokens leading to confusion among staff and patients was taken up by senior officials of the health department during an inspection last week.
Sonu Kumar, a resident of Sector 9, said long wait times outside OPDs lead to treatment delays. “We have to take out time to seek treatment at the facility, as last-minute referrals are common. Many of the current token boards are non-functional,” Kumar said.
Deepak Saini, a resident of Ravi Nagar, said a centralised system to manage patient care delivery is the need of the hour. “Digitised record keeping of patients will likely reduce confusion and bring clarity among different hospital departments,” Saini said.
Dr Neena Singh, senior medical officer and in-charge of the hospital, said that seating arrangements have been created outside the OPDs to minimise crowding, while patient examination booths were being spaced out to improve the movement of patients.
“Encroachments outside the hospital premises were cleared for safer and faster access for patients. Two additional kiosks for pharmacy services and dairy products are also expected to become operational in the coming weeks,” Dr Singh said.
