Usishtuke jomba...hyo ni phase 1 tu...phase 2 loading
The Sh730 million ultra-modern health complex being constructed at the Kilifi County Referral Hospital will be fully operational by the end of next year (2020), an official has said.
Kiilifi County Health Executive Committee Member, Dr. Anisa Omar, said phase one of the project that is being implemented at a cost of Sh450 million would be operational in March 2020 while phase two, which is estimated to cost Sh280 will be completed by December the same year.
Speaking to journalists during a free medical camp at the Cleopatra Grounds in Malindi Town Friday, Dr. Omar said the complex would house state-of-the-art diagnostic and treatment equipment for cancer and other non-communicable diseases that have become prevalent in the county.
She said once the complex becomes operational, it would help ease pressure on the Coast General and Referral Hospital in Mombasa County since the new facility is one of a kind in the region.
The medical camp was sponsored by the Kenya Society for the Blind with funding from the Insurance Regulatory Authority.
It targeted 2,000 patients who went through screening against non-communicable diseases such as cervical and breast cancer, hypertension, diabetes and screening and treatment of eye ailments that included issuance of free reading glasses.
Dr. Omar said the ground floor of the four-storey complex would house a trauma centre, an emergency unit and a cancer unit that will be equipped with cancer diagnostic equipment for cervical, breast, ovarian, prostate and colon cancer among other types of cancers as well as radiotherapy equipment.
There will also be modern radiological equipment such as digital x-ray machines and mammograms.
“We want to screen for cancer in order to discover the disease at early stages, because most of those who come to us do so when the cancer is at stage four, which is difficult to treat,” she said.
This, she said, was because the county would have modern screening and treatment tools that would help detect the ailments at the initial stages adding cancer is treatable when detected early.
She said the complex’s second floor would house an Intensive Care Unit (ICU), a High Dependency Unit (HDU), extra surgical theatres and two surgical wards, one for males and the other for females so that patients undergoing operations would not have to be mixed with other patients.
“There will also be a cardiac centre to diagnose and treat heart conditions,” she said. The complex will also have semi-private wards for patients who require some privacy.
“The facility aims at decongesting the Coast General and Referral Hospital in Mombasa which has over the years been straining to serve the entire Coast region,” she said.
The CEC member said there has been an upsurge of non-communicable diseases, whose prevalence threatened to surpass those of common diseases such as malaria, pneumonia, tuberculosis and the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes aids.
“There has been an increase in cancer cases, with cervical cancer being the most prevalent followed by breast cancer, prostate cancer, colorectal cancer and throat cancer,” she said and urged residents to seek screening services early.
She said 54 medical officers from the county had gone for further studies to specialize in areas such as trauma, oncology (a branch of medicine that deals with the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer, and pathology (the study of the causes and effects of disease or injury).
“These doctors will soon join the existing team of specialists to be able to handle the ever increasing number of patients suffering from non-communicable diseases such as cancer, hypertension and diabetes,” she said.
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