Sharing the burden: Neurosurgery dept to be set up at Khyber Teaching Hospital

Lone department at Lady Reading currently caters to all of K-P and FATA.

PESHAWAR:

The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government has decided to set up a separate neurosurgery department at Khyber Teaching Hospital to reduce the burden of patients on Lady Reading Hospital, the Peshawar High Court was informed on Wednesday.

A division bench comprising Justice Yahya Afridi and Justice Musarrat Hilali were hearing a case in which doctors had demanded the government construct a second neurosurgery ward in the city.

The counsel for Khyber Teaching Hospital, Ijaz Anwer, told the court that the provincial government will complete the construction of the new ward in the coming three months. The development is expected to reduce the number of patients going to Lady Reading to a great extent.

The petition, filed by the Lady Reading neurosurgery chief, Dr Mumtaz Ali, demands the government set up a similar department at Khyber Teaching Hospital.

Lady Reading has the second-largest ward in Pakistan after Lahore General Hospital, the petition states, adding that patients have to wait for several months if they require surgery, since the department at Lady Reading caters to the entire population of K-P and the adjacent tribal areas.

“Neurosurgery is a complicated and sensitive process,” says Dr Ali in his petition. “Patients require urgent operations in many cases, but this is not possible because there is only one department.”

The bench disposed of the writ petition after it was assured that the government will set up a neurosurgery ward in the newly constructed block at Khyber Teaching Hospital in the coming three months.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 17^th, 2014.