Karachi: Rs 632m KIHD phase-II inaugurated

[Naveed Yaseen]

By Irfan Aligi

KARACHI: City Nazim Mustafa Kamal inaugurated the Karachi Institute of Heart Diseases (KIHD) Phase-II on Friday. The project was worth Rs 632.37 million.

The KIHD phase-II has been equipped with the latest equipment for treating patients suffering from heart ailments. The facility has also opened its doors to children suffering from cardiac problems who were anxiously looking forward for their survival as earlier their treatment was not possible in country.

On the occasion of inauguration of the KIHD Phase-II, Kamal reiterated his resolve to further improve and establish modern health facilities in every nook and corner of the city. He said that cardiac patients have very little time to get resuscitated during an acute heart attack so transferring these vulnerable patients to far off heart facilities does not do much for their chances of survival. “Work on four cardiac hospitals was started of which KIHD phase-II, KIHD phase-III in Shah Faisal Town and KIHD phase-IV in Landhi Town have been completed and are fully operational and their formal inauguration will take place in the next week,” he added.

“The City District Government Karachi (CDGK) has afforded each and every penny in terms of expenditure. Neither the federal nor the provincial government provided any funds for the four cardiac hospitals in the city,” claimed Kamal.

Kamal added that at the time when he took over the CDGK as the city nazim, the KIHD was working simply as a heart clinic. “The doctors posted here had no training so they had been administering treatment for general ailments such as cough and fever. But then we paid attention and appointed 450 doctors, paramedics and other staffers, equipped the hospital with all essential equipments and ensured the availability of medicines, making the facility operational round the clock,” he added.

“The KIHDs have been providing resuscitative treatment such as angiography and angioplasty with stents for Rs 3500 and 35,000 respectively as compared to Rs 250,000 at private health facilities in city and country. The CDGK has been subsidizing these heavy costs of treatment and has saved Rs 430 million on behalf of the patients. The KIHD has so far performed 75 cardiac by-pass surgical procedures while it has plante stents to more than 1100 cardiac patients under angioplasty serial of treatment,” vowed Kamal.

Despite a financial crunch and retrenchments of funds, the CDGK has ensured that the KIHDs cater to every citizen of the country as majority of patients whether they are reporting at OPD or being treated are from interior Sindh, Punjab, Balochistan and NWFP almost for free. This is the landmark of our leadership to serve the humanity without noticing their creed or colour, remarked Kamal.

The five-storied KIHD Phase-II has the capacity to admit around 250 patients at a time and has six major departments including echocardiography, ETT and ambulatory monitoring, ESMR, CT angiography, cardiac rehabilitation and radiology. It has seven patient clinics at ground floor, four modern operation theatres, four scrub rooms, two adult cath labs, paediatric cath labs, a 10-bed surgical ICU, a six-bed paediatric ICU, 10-bed recovery rooms at the first floor, a 36-bed paediatric surgery ward, a 36-bed paediatric cardiology ward, a 36-bed male and female cardiac surgery ward, a 36-bed male and female adult cardiology ward and four nursing stations on the second floor. On the third floor, there is a 20-bed adult cardiology male ward, a 20-bed adult cardiology female ward, 10 double-bedded rooms and four single rooms for patients. On the fourth floor, there are 30 double-bedded rooms, two single rooms and four VIP rooms.

The KIHD, since Aug 2006, has catered to 247,361 patients at the OPD, 123,189 at emergency, 21,770 admissions, 59,921 laboratory procedures, 7,858 angiographies, 24,016 ETTs, 4,389 X-rays, 1,516 PPM implantations, 68 thallium scans and 683 coronary bypass surgeries.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp...09_pg12_10