Saturday 04 / May / 2024
Muscat: The Royal Hospital released a statement, clarifying about the video circulating on its vacant beds and refusal to admit COVID-19 patients.
"Currently, we have a few vacant beds. However, the increase in the number of intensive care unit (ICU) patients over the last two years has led to a shortage of nurses and other medical staff to attend to patients in wards as they are needed in the ICUs," the hospital said.
The statement added that some staffers have left or opted for early retirement.
What the numbers say
The Royal Hospital is the largest hospital in Oman, with a capacity of up to 1,200 beds. The numbers indicate that the hospital needs additional nursing staff to function at full capacity.
Statistics from the last five years indicate that the number of hospital visits has increased by nearly 200,000 annually, the number of surgeries has shot up from 8,000 to nearly 25,000 annually, the number of births has risen from 6,000 to nearly 10,000 and the number of laboratory tests have exceeded 3 million.
