BMC ‘Red Flags’ Patients In Home Isolation, Monitors Them Through 1929 Call Centre

Bhubaneswar: Taking the level of care-giving during the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic a step forward, the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to categorize patients under home isolation into two types.

While patients in home isolation with no or mild COVID symptoms are being classified as Green Flag cases, moderately-affected ones are termed as Red Flag patients.

In order to know the health status of Red Flag patients, BMC Commissioner Sanjay Kumar Singh has directed that daily calls be made to patients for three days at a stretch. That will ensure effective and efficient health monitoring of patients.

Executives manning outbound call stations at the 1929 24×7 Call Centre, situated in the Bhubaneswar Operations Centre of Bhubaneswar Smart City Limited (BSCL) office, have started calling home isolation patients under the Red Flag category since last evening.

On Day 1, they called 22 Red Flag patients and noted their health status.

The Red Flag patients’ list is prepared after going through inputs of the Rapid Response Teams (RRTs) – which include experienced doctors — at the zonal level.

As the civic body is divided into three administrative zones for achieving better citizen-centric service, the list from respective Zonal Deputy Commissioner’s office is being prepared by a senior official deployed for monitoring the COVID situation. After receiving the list, executives at 1929 24×7 Call Centre at BSCL office contact the Red Flag or moderately-affected patients.

This categorization of home isolation patients will ensure that BMC will now be able to monitor health parameters of moderately-affected COVID patients staying at home, so that shifting them to the hospital, when needed, would be easier.

Secondly, through this innovative exercise, the moderately-affected patients can have a conversation with available doctors at the 1929 24×7 Call Center, in case of any urgent development. While 7 doctors are available at 1929 24×7 Call Centre during morning and afternoon shifts now, while 4 doctors are present during night shift.