PESHAWAR: The second Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital and Research Centre will start operations in Peshawar on Tuesday (today).

Initially, there would be 20 chemotherapy beds, six emergency room beds, 12 admission beds, two intensive care unit beds, radiology services, including mammography, plain radiology and ultrasonography and pathology laboratory at the hospital.

In the first phase, the hospital will provide X-ray, CT scan, MRI, chemotherapy and pathological services to the patients that will be followed by radiation services in the second phase, planned by 2015, and surgery after one year.

“It will be 30 per cent bigger than SKMCH&RC Lahore with more sophisticated equipment,” Dr Faisal Sultan, the chief executive officer SKMCH&RC Lahore, told Dawn. Lahore hospital, which was built in 19194, has 200 beds and the strength of beds will reach to 400 over a period of three years.

Former chief minister Ameer Haider Khan Hoti also invited to inaugural ceremony

Imran Khan, the chairman of Board of Governors Shaukat Khanum Memorial Trust, will inaugurate the hospital having eight-storey structures in Hayatabad Township.

ANP provincial president Ameer Haider Khan Hoti, who allotted land for the hospital when he was chief minister of the province in the previous provincial government, has also been invited to the inaugural ceremony.

Dr Faisal said that of the total cost, Rs3 billion was spent on construction of international standard structures, designed by a US-based architect, who also designed the cancer hospital in Lahore. “We have taken care of flaws that have been made in Lahore,” he added.

Imran Khan launched donation appeal for Rs800 million to equip the hospital in early November and raised Rs860 million on the eve of the inauguration of the hospital for which 50-kanal land was donated by the previous provincial government.

In the live worldwide fundraising telethon on late Sunday night, Imran Khan was accompanied by celebrities Waseem Akram, Atif Aslam, Ibrarul Haq, Javed Sheikh and Ahsan Khan while the background onscreen appeals were made by Reema Khan, Bushra Ansari, Javed Miandad, Anwar Maqsood and Rahat Feteh Ali Khan to make up for the deficit of Rs210 million.

Dr Asim Yousaf, the chief medical officer of SKMCH&RC, said that 25 per cent of the cancer patients checked in Lahore belonged to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Federally Administered Tribal Areas and Afghanistan. They faced accommodation problems in Lahore and bore travel costs, he said.

“Every year, we get 50,000 patients but only 8000 are taken due to space. We are also embarking upon Karachi hospital where land has been acquired,” said Dr Asim. He added that on an average per month cost for cancer treatment was about Rs1 million which most patients couldn’t afford.

“We spend Zakat and donations besides our own income from collection centres and charges from paying patients on poor patients. Doctors don’t know about paying and non-paying ones,” he said.

Dr Asim said that they spent Rs7 billion on the free treatment of 75 per cent patients.

Published in Dawn, December 29th, 2015