Bhubaneswar: With the surge of cases in the second wave of the pandemic, the dedicated 104 Covid helpline in the state is being flooded with distress calls, much more than the first wave.
The officials managing the dedicated call centre of Covid assistance said that every day a large number of calls are received by the centre which runs the 24×7 helpline to give hand holding support to Covid patients, their caregivers and other information seekers.
“Every day we are witnessing around 16,000 distress calls made by patients or their caregivers. Some days, the numbers go up to 23,000. We have observed that there are more panic calls during the second wave of the pandemic in comparison to the first wave,” said Sabyasachi Biswal, state head of Ziqitza Private Limited, the agency which manages the 104 Covid helpline.
The helpline is supported by state Health department and the National Health Mission (NHM).
He also added that adequate number of doctors has been arranged for the helpline service while trained call centre executives are taking care of the information and treatment needs of the callers by connecting them with the doctors and health experts.
“We have at least 26 doctors for giving free telemedicine consultations to the patients. They are taking stock of the health conditions of the patients under home isolation and prescribing authentic drugs required for the treatment,” Biswal said.
As per the guidelines, the 104 helpline connects the patients with rapid response teams of the respective districts who prescribe the required drugs for the treatment of Covid-19 infections.
With a well defined structure for Covid management, the nodal officers of each district are also contacted for medical assistance to the infected people. “On several occasions, we get calls which require coordinated efforts from the district-level officials. We pass on the messages to the nodal officers of districts for quick response in this regard,” Biswal added.
The helpline staffers claimed that they are also sharing information regarding the availability of beds at various hospitals with the patients and their caregivers. The management has allowed work from home option for many employees of the call centre, including female staffers, to reduce the chance of contracting the disease at workplace.
It is learnt that the helpline is also getting several prank calls. “We are also getting several prank calls. Some mischievous persons often try to keep the helpline number busy by making prank calls. This is affecting our work to some extent,” said a female executive of the 104 helpline.
PNN