A gift from UAE: Pindi gets modern health facility

External views of the newly built Emirate Hospital at MH Rawalpindi. PHOTO: EXPRESS

ISLAMABAD: 

Residents of Rawalpindi and its surrounding areas are set to get a fully functional, state-of-the-art health facility soon, The Express Tribune has learnt.

The Emirates Hospital, as it is named, was said to be one of the largest health projects in Pakistan by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) under its Pakistan Assistance Programme (PAP) costing $173 million.

With a total capacity of 1,000 beds, the hospital is expected to cater to over 60,000 patients in its different departments including gynaecology and a liver transplant centre.

The first phase of the hospital has already been completed at a cost of $108 million and became operational in the first week of this month.

The entire project is planned to be completed by March 2014.

Sharing the details of the project an official requesting not to be named said that the building is being constructed within the premises of the Military Hospital (MH).

The official said that the existing infrastructure of MH has deteriorated due to lack of resources and overload warranting a major reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts. Considering that the UAE government has made this grant.

“The hospital was actually a gift to the people of Pakistan from the UAE government aimed at easing the humanitarian crisis facing the country after the consecutive floods [in 2010 and 2011],” he said.

This facility will have a number of centres of excellence where difficult cases could be referred for expert opinions.

It will also have an outdoor patient department (OPD) complex, an indoor patient department, an accident and emergency department, a diagnostics centre and officers and family wards.

It will provide various kinds of diagnostic facilities such as biomedical laboratory, microscope camera system, computed radiography system, fluoroscopy digital system.

The idea behind constructing the complex which will house 17 OPDs of different departments such as gynecology, vaccine, rheumatology, pediatric surgery, rehabilitation, nephrology among others, was to bring all the consultancy services under one roof, said the official.

Previously all the OPDs were scattered over the premises which created problems for patients in terms of accessibility.

“It is hoped that the hospital will prove to be a benchmark in quality health services,” said the official.