March 29, 2024, 4:00 pm


Al Fahad

Published:
2020-02-12 23:13:42 BdST

44 district hospitals to get kidney dialysis unit by 2022


To better serve around two crore kidney patients across the country, the government is going to set up kidney dialysis and nephrology units in all medical college hospitals and district-level hospitals.

The existing facilities will be beefed up as part of the project.

The Executive Committee of National Economic Council (Ecnec) yesterday approved a project involving Tk 255.22 crore in a meeting held at the NEC Conference Room in city's Sher-e-Bangla Nagar area.

Under the project, each of some 22 medical college hospitals will have a 50-bed kidney dialysis unit while each of some 44 district-level hospitals will have a 10-bed nephrology and dialysis unit.

The facilities will be established between January 2020 and December 2022.

Experts have welcomed the decision and said the mass people would be benefitted if the project is implemented properly.

chronic kidney diseases (CKD) is a slow and progressive loss of kidney function over a period of several years.

In Bangladesh, around two crore people suffer from CKD each year, according to the Kidney Foundation.

Of them, some 40,000 suffer from complete kidney failure and only 20 percent of this 40,000 patients receive treatment.

"Our study reveals that 75 percent of patients who start kidney dialysis stop taking it within six months due to their inability to bear the expenses," Prof Harun-Ur-Rashid, president of Kidney Foundation recently told The Daily Star.

Prof AK Azad Khan, president of Bangladesh Diabetic Association yesterday told this newspaper, "This is certainly a good decision. People would get benefit from it."

"Any dialysis centre requires operation cost. We hope these would run properly," he added.

Meanwhile, the Ecnec also approved eight more projects in the same meeting involving around Tk 2,167 crore.

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