Green light finally given to country’s first neurosciences centre at PIMS

Islamabad: Though the country's first centre of neurosciences at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences has long been in the works, things have begun shaping up for it.

Headed by Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, the ECNEC, a top economic decision making body in the country, on Tuesday gave the green light to the Rs7.3 billion initiative, which remained stuck in the red tape for around four years. To be put up in three years on the PIMS, the city's premier government hospital, to offer diagnostic and therapeutic facilities under one roof, including research and training in the field, the neurosciences centre will have 500 beds, including 100 at neurology, psychiatry, neurosurgery and emergency departments each, 50 at paediatric neurology department, 10 at neurology rehabilitation department and 40 at basic neurosciences and research department. There will also be a modern multidisciplinary, well-equipped stroke centre.

Besides Rs1.5 billion equipment, the proposed building will also have four floors and a basement, separate access, and own parking lot for 500 vehicles. According to PIMS executive director, specialists will be hired from the private sector for the centre as the hospital doesn't have such trained staff members for the purpose.

Overall, the centre will be manned by around 700 people in different departments and categories. Currently, the public sector hospitals have no centre with neurological specialities, including diagnostic and therapeutic services. The PIMS has 30 in-patient wards of neurology, psychiatry, paediatrics neurology and neurosurgery but it struggles to cater to the influx of patients coming in from Islamabad, Potohar region, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit-Baltistan, and Azad Jammu and Kashmir. Also, the hospital's neurology department doesn't have a special stroke unit and facilities to conduct specialised neurological investigations, while the necessary separate rehabilitation facility for stroke patients and the patients with other neurological disorders is also missing.

The neuroscience centre is likely to see 90,000 to 110,000 OPD patients and 45,000 admissions every year. The PIMS executive director strongly felt that besides ensuring quality patient care, the facility would also help improve research on disease burden and management.