Mangaluru’s Wenlock Hospital asks health centres to check ICU bed availability before referring patients
Mangalore Today News Network
Mangaluru, Jul 11, 2026: District Wenlock Hospital Superintendent Dr. Shivaprakash DS has urged hospitals across Karnataka and neighbouring states to verify ICU bed availability before referring critically ill patients to Wenlock Hospital, citing mounting pressure on its intensive care facilities.
Addressing mediapersons, Dr. Shivaprakash said the hospital receives a large number of referrals from across the state and neighbouring regions, making ICU bed availability a significant challenge.
In a letter to the Commissioner of Health and Family Welfare, he sought comprehensive guidelines for referring patients under the Ayushman Bharat Arogya Karnataka (ABArK) and non-ABArK schemes. The proposed guidelines are aimed at ensuring timely treatment while optimising the use of available healthcare resources.
Wenlock Hospital currently has 116 ICU beds, including 21 Medical ICU beds and 27 Surgical ICU beds. However, many district hospitals continue to refer critically ill patients without prior intimation or confirmation of bed availability, creating difficulties in accommodating emergency cases.
Dr. Shivaprakash said that despite repeated communications from the District Health Officer (DHO) and the hospital administration to all DHOs and district hospital superintendents regarding the Wenlock help desk for checking bed availability, several hospitals still refer patients without prior coordination. In such instances, the help desk is forced to identify available beds in other hospitals under the ABArK scheme and arrange patient transfers, leading to delays in treatment.
To streamline the referral process, the hospital has proposed a 10-point Standard Operating Procedure (SoP). The recommendations include confirming bed availability before referral, ensuring referrals are made only for genuine medical reasons, maintaining records of referred-in and referred-out patients, and submitting referral data to the DHO to monitor referral patterns.
He also stressed the need for closer monitoring of inter-district referrals so that patients can be treated within their home districts whenever possible, thereby reducing unnecessary transfers and ensuring better utilisation of healthcare resources.
Dr. Shivaprakash said the hospital has already requested the government to sanction an additional 50 ICU beds to meet the growing demand. He noted that increasing ICU capacity would also require additional staff, explaining that two ICU beds require one nurse, while four post-operative ICU beds require one nurse.
The hospital is also planning to introduce an online system displaying real-time ICU bed availability, enabling referring hospitals to verify bed status before transferring patients.
Meanwhile, Dakshina Kannada DHO Dr. H.R. Thimmaiah said private hospitals empanelled under the ABArK scheme should not collect treatment charges from referred patients, as the government reimburses the expenses. He added that Health Minister U. T. Khader is likely to convene a state-level meeting to review the implementation of the ABArK scheme and discuss revisions to the package rates under the scheme.