PIH vows to lift standard at hospital

By ALISON ANIS
PAPUA New Guineans needing urgent medical treatment or surgery may no longer have to dig deep into their pockets for costly overseas trips.
Pacific International Hospital (PIH), as the successful bidder for Port Moresby Private Hospital in Boroko, following a tender process will bring these services on shore at a more affordable rate.
PIH medical director Dr Amyna Sultan said they would carry out refurbishment to the hospital and bring it up to an international standard with the best international practices and state-of-the-art facilities where they could perform diagnosis and operations on heart disease and cancer patients.
“The purpose of the new hospital is to bring all the treatment facilities that patients need to diagnose as well as treat cancer and cardiac arrests and associated diseases because not all Papua New Guineans have the money to go to Australia to get proper medical treatment,” Sultan said.
She said she was excited about the new hospital since it was going to change the face of health care in PNG.
 The 79-bed hospital building will soon be refurbished by PIH to house the new and expanded PIH.
“The hospital is expected to open in 2012 and will continue to be developed in stages over the next three years to provide new specialist medical services currently unavailable in PNG,” she said.
Sultan said the hospital would be enrolled in an international hospital accreditation programme and would offer emergency care, operations and rehabilitation centre, all under one roof.
She said the hospital would go through three stages that include the introduction of interventional radiology and cardiology, neurology, endoscopy and minimally invasive paproscopic surgery (key-hole surgery) for general, urology, gynaecology and orthopaedic procedures which would offer faster recovery times for patients.
The cancer service will include a chemo-infusion centre that will offer chemotherapy while the heart centre, equipped with a cardiac catheterisation laboratory and a modern cardiac critical care unit, is anticipated to be ready in the next year. 
“This will allow the facility to conduct cardiac angiography procedure to diagnose patients with blocked arteries and angioplasty with procedures to open up the blocked arteries for the treatment of ischemic heart disease (heart attack), which tends to be fatal and has become a growing concern in PNG,” Sultan said.
Prevention, diagnosis and treatment of diabetes-related illnesses and complications will be introduced with a specialist team of endocrinologist, nephrologist, cardiologist and an ophthalmologist.
A neurology unit with specialised care and a rehabilitation service for patients with strokes would also be set up.
The cardiac services in phase two will be expanded to include cardiac surgery and offer open heart surgeries for bypass and valve replacements.
The introduction of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanning and neurosurgery and plastic and cosmetic surgery, immunology and rheumatology services will come after.