Surat: New Civil Hospital (NCH) has introduced a barcode booklet system in its medicine and orthopaedic outpatient departments to reduce waiting time and ease crowding by replacing traditional paper case files with digitally accessible patient records.The initiative was inaugurated at the hospital’s Kidney Building on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s birthday. Hospital officials said the medicine department handles around 1,000 OPD patients every day, while the orthopaedic department sees about 500.Under the new system, patients will get a barcode-enabled booklet instead of a case paper. By scanning the barcode, hospital staff can instantly access a patient’s treatment history, making follow-up visits quicker and more organised. Officials said the process is expected to reduce long registration queues and improve patient flow in OPD areas.Medical superintendent Dr Parul Vadgama said the hospital’s priority is to improve patient convenience while ensuring wider access to treatment. She said the new digital process is expected to significantly reduce OPD queues and crowding within the next 15 days.By the revised workflow, first-time visitors will be issued a barcode booklet, while follow-up patients can directly approach the nursing desk in the OPD for barcode scanning. The system is linked to tablet-based registration, reducing manual data entry and helping minimise human errors.“The facility will enable the hospital administration to improve the overall services,” said Dr Ketan Naik, resident medical officer.To support the rollout, the hospital has increased scanning and nursing stations from two to four in the Medicine OPD and from two to three in the Orthopaedic OPD.Under the earlier process, patients had to queue to obtain case papers, register in the relevant department and wait again to consult doctors, often repeating the process after undergoing tests. Hospital officials said the barcode-based system has already helped reduce waiting time to some extent.
