PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has approved Rs1932 million for three catheterisation laboratories (cath labs), two each in Dera Ismail Khan and Bacha Khan Medical Complex in Swabi.
Dera Ismail Khan has become the first district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where two Cath labs will be established in the public sector hospitals. Also, DI Khan will again become the first district where a cath lab will be installed in the District Headquarters Hospital, and another machine will be set up at the Mufti Mahmud Memorial Hospital, which is the Medical Teaching Institute (MTI). According to government officials, then chief minister, Ali Amin Gandapur during his tenure had done some initial work for approving funds for the two cath labs in his native DI Khan district.
It will be a challenge for the government and particularly the DHQ administration to cope with the cath lab as the hospital will need a Cardiology Department and trained staff including interventional cardiologists. The third cath lab will be installed at the Bacha Khan Medical Complex (BKMC) in Swabi. Each machine will cost Rs570 million, and the government has also approved some additional funds for civil works in DI Khan.
When Dr Khalid Mahsud was appointed as Hospital Director BKMC in 2021, he started efforts for getting funds to establish a cath lab in the hospital as all the cardiac patients requiring angiography, useda to be sent to Peshawar and Islamabad.
He was later appointed HD for the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences in Islamabad and again when he was selected as HD for BKMC, Dr Khalid Masud started efforts for the projects he had planned.
Dr Khalid Masud had better utilised personal assistance of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leaders from Swabi, Asad Qaiser Khan and Shahram Khan Tarakai and the chairman of the Board of Governors of BKMC, Lt-Gen (retired) Dr Salahuddin Ahmad, all belong to the same district, in materialising the project. In Mardan district, a Cath lab machine was installed at the Mardan Medical Complex by a private firm, under public probate partnership.
The people of Mardan were anxiously waiting for a senior PTI leader Atif Khan to play his role and bring some funds for his native district, particularly for incomplete projects in health including under-construction building of District Headquarter Hospital Mardan etc.
