Pediatric Department

Pediatrics department of GMSH-16 is working since the hospital started in the year 1956. It is one of the largest departments of the hospital.

The department functions from 5 work stations:-

• Pediatric Emergency
• 2 Newborn Units providing care to inborn and outborn newborns
• Pediatric Ward
• Out Patient Department (OPD)
• Peripheral newborn unit: including labour room, OT and postnatal wards

Pediatric Emergency

Pediatric emergency provides 24*7 Emergency services to the patients where Basic Resuscitation to advanced services are provided to the patients. It caters to a wide spectrum of pediatric emergencies like acute diarrhoeal diseases with dehydration, respiratory disorders like asthma and pneumonia, neurological problems like seizures, meningitis and encephalitis, metabolic emergencies like diabetic ketoacidosis, poisoning, envenomations, etc. The emergency is the point of first contact where the patient is first stabilized and it has 8 beds for sick and 3 bedded newborn stabilization unit.

Newborn Unit

Two units are accredited by National Neonatology forum as level II NICU where critical and sick newborns, preterm babies, very low birth weight newborns are managed by trained, qualified and skilled staff available round the clock. They are equipped with state of art equipment required for monitoring and care of sick and high risk neonates. The facility of mechanical ventilation and Arterial Blood gas analysis , CPAP was added to the armamentarium in year 2015.

Pediatric Ward

After stabilization in the emergency, the patients are managed in the ward which has 30 plus 2 isolation beds.

Pediatric OPD

It has daily OPD of 300 to 400 patients per day. Apart from patient care, all UIP as well as additional vaccinations are provided to the children and adolescents daily. Vaccination available free of cost under the national immunization program are: BCG, OPV, Pentavac, DPT, MR, Hepatitis B, DT, Rotavaccine and  IPV (at 6 weeks and 14 weeks).

Various special clinics are held on fixed days. These are as under:-

Periphery

The peripheral newborn unit comprises:-

• Newborn care corners in the labour room and operation theatre which are fully equipped to resuscitate the newborn at birth where normal newborn care is provided in the delivery room.
• Postnatal wards where normal babies are roomed in with mothers and routine newborn care is provided.
• All New born babies are screened for 3 metabolic inherited disorders i.e. hypothyroidism, G-6PD deficiency and congenital adrenal hyperplasia along with the routine clinical screening for congenital defects and critical cogenital heart diseases.
• Ours is a Baby- friendly hospital, exclusive breast feeding is promoted by all staff members and all components of BFHI are followed sincerely.
• T-Piece Resuscitation  for new born babies in Labour room.
• Provision of Surfactant to Preterm babies in Nursery.
• Provision of Kangaroo Mother Care to Low Birth Weight Babies.

The department is the referral centre for various dispensaries in and around Chandigarh. Our centre is running the only nutritional rehabilitation centre (NRC) in Chandigarh which provides free services both outdoor and indoor services with 5 beds in pediatric ward. District early intervention centre is being run in hospital for early screening of 30 diseases under disabilities, deficiency disease, development delay and congenital defects. We are doing Thoracocentesis, Chest tube Drainage, Ascitic Tap, Lumbar Puncture, Gastric aspirate for AFB and CBNAAT, Mantoux Test(Tuberculin Skin test), Echocardiography, Spirometry, Exchange Transfusion and Nebulization in our department.

The department is actively involved in academic and research activities and work is presented at various National and International Forum. There is participation in multi centric collaborative projects in various national and international trials.

The department is running a Postgraduate DNB programme from year 2004 and presently there is intake of 6 candidates per year (3 primary and 3 secondary) which is accredited by National Board of Examination, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India.

Dr. Sadbhawana

(Head of Department)