PESHAWAR: The Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital and Research Centre, Peshawar, is providing free treatment to more than 90 per cent of the visitors, its chief medical officer Dr Aasim Yusuf said.

“We receive patients not only from within Khyber Pakhtunkhwa but from Afghanistan as well for cancer diagnosis and treatment, and 93 per cent of them get care free of charge. This percentage is 75 in the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital in Lahore,” Dr Yusuf told a function on Friday night.

The event was organised by the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Trust to collect donations as part of its ongoing zakat campaign in the current month of Ramazan. People gave away Rs50 million to the trust.

Dr Yusuf said cancer treatment was very expensive, and only generous donations by people made the hospital’s free treatment possible.

Official says SKMCHRC caters for patients from KP, Afghanistan

He appreciated donors and informed them about the SKMT’s ongoing projects.

The medical director said the SKMCHRC, Peshawar, which completed eight years of operations in December 2023, was the only hospital in the province to have achieved the “Enterprise Accreditation” from the Joint Commission International.

He said previously, cancer patients from the region had to travel to Lahore, Islamabad, and Karachi for diagnosis and treatment.

“We provide care to patients under one roof, saving them time and money,” he said.

Dr Yusuf said since the hospital became operational, tens of thousands of patients, both adults and children, have availed themselves of a wide range of clinical services.

“We’ve so far conducted more than 110,000 chemotherapy sessions, while the sessions carried out by our radiotherapy unit—the most modern in the region with high-tech machines—total 95,000. Also, our highly skilled surgeons have performed more than 3,700 surgical procedures in the technologically advanced operating rooms and provided high-quality post-operative care to patients since April 2021,” he said.

The medical director said his hospital had provided deserving patients with Rs88 billion worth of care since 1994.

He said the zakat collected by the hospital was utilised in strict compliance with the teachings of Islam.

Dr Yusuf said zakat funds were spent on the treatment of deserving patients and were utilised during the year of collection.

“We have got sharia compliance certification proving that our Zakat processes are in line with Islamic principles,” he said.

The medical director said all kinds of cancer treatment were available at his hospital.

He said in the past, 30 per cent of patients examined by Lahore’s Shaukat Khanum Cancer Hospital belonged to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and Afghanistan and therefore, the need for putting up a similar facility in Peshawar arose, leading to its construction in 2015.

Dr Yusuf said the Joint Commission International accreditation was awarded to Lahore’s cancer hospital in 2018 and Peshawar’s in 2019, while they got the JCI Enterprise Accreditation in 2022.

He said the Shaukat Khanum cancer hospitals were certified by the Quality in Oncology Practice Initiative Certification Programme, which was associated with the American Society of Clinical Oncology, in September 2023.

“These accomplishments prove that the high-quality cancer treatment available at our hospital is on a par with that of Lahore’s,” he said.

Published in Dawn, March 24th, 2024