MSF to hand over unit at Timergara DHQ Hospital to KP govt tomorrow

TIMERGARA: The Medicines Sans Frontiers (MSF) or Doctors Without Borders, an international non-governmental organisation, has announced to hand over the emergency unit at the District Headquarters Hospital Timergara to the Ministry of Health, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, on March 1.

Speaking at a news conference at the Timergara Press Club, MSF Project Coordinator in Timergara, Euo Spellman, said the MSF would hand over the DHQ emergency unit to the Health Department tomorrow after 11 years of medical services. Flanked by MSF Communication Manager Nasir Ghafoor and Medical Focal Person Said Raziq, he said the MSF staff would, however, remain in the emergency unit till the end of March to ensure smooth transition and continuation of services to the patients.

Euo Spellman said the MSF had announced to hand over the hospital to the Ministry of Health in three phases and the process would be completed by January 2021. He said the steering committee had been formed in collaboration with the Health Ministry to manage the handover process as per the plan of handing over three emergency departments by January, next year. The MSF has been supporting the District Headquarters Hospital in Timergara since February 2009. Its teams provided medical services in the emergency department and offered comprehensive emergency obstetric and neonatal care.

Other MSF services at the Timergara DHQ Hospital included a cardiac corner in the emergency room, a kangaroo mother care unit, health promotion activities, psychological counselling, emergency X-rays, sterilisation, laundry, blood bank and waste management activities. Only from January to September 2019, the MSF examined 140,055 patients in the emergency department, assisted 11,201 births and admitted 1,683 newborns to the Timergara DHQ Hospital whereas the emergency unit under MSF had provided emergency cover to a total of 1.58 million patients up to January 2020.