Sajida Hospital Pvt. Ltd in Jatrabari, Dhaka

SAJIDA operates two multidisciplinary secondary care hospitals – one in Keraniganj with 100 beds and another in Narayanganj with 70 beds – providing comprehensive health care with the provision of advanced medical and surgical care and modern diagnostic facilities. These services are provided by expert medical professionals, skilled nurses/paramedics and technologists, using the most modern technology.

SAJIDA’s health interventions, which initially started at a very small scale at the community level, were driven by the need to cater to the unmet health needs of millions of people in Bangladesh who do not have regular access to essential health care services. Focusing primarily on maternal and child care, SAJIDA began by providing health services through satellite clinics, which was followed by a static centre with an operation facility. Eventually, with rising demand from the community, SAJIDA established its first hospital in Keraniganj in 2005 with the mission to provide quality health care and meet the health care needs of the community. The success of the Keraniganj hospital prompted the establishment of a second hospital in Narayanganj in 2010. Both hospitals run with the principle of providing quality care at affordable cost, ensuring a client-friendly environment. The hospitals practice and publicize a free schedule for most of its services that make it convenient for patients to avail the services without any uncertainty of treatment cost. The competitive and economic nature of the rates allow patients to access health care without any delay.

SAJIDA hospitals are fully equipped with modern facilities and qualified doctors, nurses and paramedics with multidisciplinary services and specialist care including surgery, Gymea obs, medicine, child care, ENT, Eye care services and 24 hours emergency medical services. A doctor at the emergency, at the indoor and a senior experienced doctor remain on duty at night along with paramedics and nurses to manage all emergency and medical cases. Besides these curative services, SAJIDA hospitals also provide family planning and EPI services in collaboration with the government.

Out-patient services

Outdoor consultation services are provided 12 hours a day and 7 days a week by specialists of major disciplines like Medicine, Surgery, Gynecology, Obstetrics, Pediatrics, Orthopedic, ENT, Eye care, dentistry etc. along with the general duty physicians. Counseling and distribution of contraceptives and EPI services have also been introduced in the hospital outdoor services. Consultant schedules and diagnostic services along with fees are displayed in prominent positions within and outside the hospital for the patients to get a clear idea and access to appropriate healthcare services. The hospitals have a 24-hour emergency department attended by experienced medical officers and a pharmacy is also open from 8:30 am till midnight.

In-patient services

Outdoor patients requiring admission or hospitalization are admitted for indoor services for all specialist care. Admitted patients are provided with the option of general beds, air-conditioned and non-air-conditioned cabins. The Keraniganj hospital has 55 general beds, 5 air-conditioned cabins and 16 non air-conditioned cabins while Narayanganj hospital constitutes 40 beds and 14 cabins. Both hospitals have fully equipped operation rooms where different operations like general surgery, orthopedic surgery, Gynea/obstetrical operations, Eye/ENT, surgeries etc. The operation theaters are equipped with modern instruments and equipments and staffed by qualified surgeon, anesthetist and other support staff and perform all major surgeries, including emergency operations. For normal deliveries, the hospitals are equipped with labour rooms and well experienced nurses to facilitate in-house child-birth.

Diagnostic Facilities

SAJIDA Hospitals are equipped with modern diagnostic facilities, including laboratories that include pathology, bio-chemistry, micro-biological services including ultrasonography in colour and black and white, 3D color and digital X-Ray and all other diagnostic services. To ensure the quality of the laboratory services, technologists are supervised and monitored by a senior consultant. Additionally, a second consultant visits the laboratories on a daily basis to ensure accuracy of the laboratory reports being provided to the patients. Both hospitals have several qualified laboratory technologists carrying out diagnostic services.

Ensuring Quality Care

One of the main objectives of the SAJIDA hospitals is to provide quality care to all patients at affordable costs while ensuring the best clinical environment and patient friendliness. To this end, the hospital prioritizes maintaining a clean and hygienic hospital environment; ensuring effective communication between doctors, nurses and patients; infection prevention and control; pre-cautionary measures for operation theatres; quality of laboratory tests; proper and timely referrals; reduction in waiting time and standard waste disposal procedure. The quality of paramedics/nurses is maintained and enhanced through hands-on training by responsible consultants of SAJIDA Hospital’s respective units. A culture of continuous discussion on various issues is maintained to mitigate limitations and shortcomings that they face in carrying out their duties with utmost care and patience. SAJIDA also engages national and international experts for quality control and continuous improvement of its hospital services.

Hospital Price Package

To minimize any confusion or obstacles faced by patients regarding information on costs and fees, SAJIDA hospitals display rate charts and fees of all hospital services at major locations including the reception area. Additionally, open package deals are offered for different operations that include pre-operative, operative and post-operative costs, medication and bed rent that are free from any kind of hidden charge. These packages are offered at a very competitive rate to increase the chances of patients availing the deals. SAJIDA has also introduced “health cards” at Taka 150 with maturity of one year to enable individuals to enjoy discounts on different hospital services and the percentage of discount of each service is also detailed out in the chart. This particularly benefits disadvantaged groups who face financial limitations in accessing hospital services.

Hospital Caregivers

SAJIDA’s 24-hour hospitals follow the organization’s HR guideline. A medical officer is always available at the emergency and indoor services at each hospital. Multidisciplinary specialist care is offered in two shifts from 9 am to 8 pm by regular consultants, while senior and experienced consultants practice at the chambers on a temporary basis. Two senior shifts in-charge work at the hospitals along with nurses/paramedics. Support staffs work with the emergency doctors. The staffs are trained on handling emergency patients, providing wheel chairs, stretchers, trolley and taking them to the doctors’ chambers and diagnostic center. Highly qualified technologists and technicians are recruited at the diagnostic services.

Hospital Governance

The hospital services are divided into different units. The hospital coordinator, along with the Heads of each unit and other staff coordinate the overall hospital management. Each unit is managed by the Head of the unit and the roles and responsibilities of each team is clearly defined. These teams conduct weekly meetings to troubleshoot and discuss various issues regarding their activities. The unit Heads sit with the hospital coordinator on a monthly basis to ensure the quality of care, coordination and smooth operation of the hospital. The Advisor from the Head Office supervises and provides necessary guidance to the hospital management, analyzes the hospital performance and reports to the Executive Director. Major decisions regarding service improvement and management of the hospitals are taken at SAJIDA Foundation’s Senior Management Committee meetings.

Management Information System

SAJIDA introduced standard software from the very beginning for total monitoring and proper management information system. The software includes a programmatic section as well as a financial section that is able to generate unit wise daily, monthly and yearly data. It thus helps in complete monitoring and assesses the performance of different units simultaneously and the trend in the hospitals’ overall performance. Single ID user interface has been introduced at the reception to observe the total number of patients as well as the number of services being availed by patients. The software also makes it possible to make inventory of the medicines biannually and make quarterly analytical reports on the basis of need; sometimes of a single unit, sometimes of the entire hospital consolidated etc.