An inordinate wait for MRI facility at the Gandhi Hospital here has finally come to an end. Health Minister T. Harish Rao inaugurated a state-of-the-art Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) machine and a catheterisation lab on Sunday.
The cost of MRI scanning at private diagnosis centres is steep, ranging anywhere between ₹5,000 and ₹15,000 or even higher, thereby making it unaffordable for the poor. Gandhi Hospital is a tertiary care centre, which receives a large number of critical patients, and with the MRI facility unavailable for the past several months, there was a long waiting list of patients to avail the facility at Osmania General Hospital.
The procedures that would be taken up at the cath lab includes coronary angiogram, permanent pacing, renal artery stenting and arterial embolisation for uncontrolled bleeding, among other procedures. Pointing to Cardiology department head Nitin Kabra, Mr Harish Rao said they had asked for the facility to be provided to prove their mettle.
Stating that the 13,000 vacancies in the Health department would be filled soon, the Minister added that contract staff and doctors who worked during the COVID-19 pandemic would be given weightage in the recruitment process.
Organ transplant
On the occasion, Mr Harish Rao listed facilities that would be added to Gandhi Hospital in the coming months, and said that ₹100 crore has been allotted for development of the hospital. Of that, ₹13 crore was spent on the MRI machine, and ₹9 crore on the cath lab.
“An organ transplant centre would be constructed on the eighth floor at a cost of ₹30 crore . It would have nine theatres where transplantation of kidneys, liver, heart, lungs, as well as knee and hip replacements would be taken up,” he said while addressing a press conference held at the hospital. The transplant centre is another facility which is long awaited.
Fertility centre
It would take two months to open the proposed fertility centre at Gandhi Hospital, the Minister said, following up a recent announcement. Such centres are planned to be opened at Gandhi Hospital, Modern Government Maternity Hospital in Petlaburj, and Mahatma Gandhi memorial Hospital in Warangal.
Mr Harish Rao said it would take two-months to provide the services, including in-vitro fertilisation (IVF). Around ₹7.5 crore would be spent to set up the fertility centres at the three government hospitals.
He added that a new canteen would come up at Gandhi at a cost of ₹2.5 crore. A new sewage facility would also be provided. He has also said that 48 knee replacements were performed by orthopedicians at the hospital in the past three to four months.
Since it is a tertiary care hospital, the number of patients always exceeds the bed capacity, and the numbers continue to increase. However, the number of employees in sanitation and security, and patient care providers stayed at 392. Mr Harish Rao said the three sections would see an addition of 273 persons.
