The Karnataka Government intends to open super speciality hospitals in all revenue divisions of the State and kidney dialysis units in every district hospital, Medical Education Minister Sharan Prakash Patil has said.
“We want to start super speciality hospitals in each division (Mysore, Gulbarga and Belgaum),” he told reporters here today. “We are going to make it mandatory for all district hospitals to have dialysis units.’’
He said that the peripheral cancer treatment centre in Gulbarga would be converted into a full-fledged one in two phases and it would cater to the patients of Hyderabad-Karnataka region.
The Government has decided to reopen the Rajiv Gandhi Super Speciality Hospital, better known as OPEC hospital, as it was established with an aid from the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries.
The hospital was opened by Congress President Sonia Gandhi in 2000 and handed over to Apollo Hospitals for management under government supervision a year later. The MoU between the Government and Apollo expired last year and the hospital is shut for the past 13 months.
“We want to start it on our own (will be run by Government),” Patil said. The Government has approved calling for tenders to refurbish the hospital at an estimated cost of around Rs 1.2 crore.