A $65 million modern emergency centre is to be established at the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital to offer more timely and efficient emergency services to patients. Work on the new emergency centre, to be called Emergency and Clinical Specialties Centre, is expected to begin by June, this year and complete within 18 months, at most. It will be constructed on 12 acres between the Fevers Unit and the mortuary. The Chief Executive Officer of the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, Prof. Nii Otu Nartey, who made this known to the Daily Graphic, said the hospital had finished documentation on the centre while the Canadian consultants for the project had already submitted a draft master plan. He said his outfit had begun sourcing funds from OPEC and the Kuwaiti Funds and indicated that the organisations had given assurance of their readiness to support the project. Prof. Nartey said the Trauma Centre and the Surgical Medicine Centre would be merged into the new emergency centre. Besides, a radiological centre, a laboratory facility and a new surgical eye centre would be incorporated into it. He said the current emergency centre would be used for a different purpose. He indicated that the current emergency centre lacked the needed facilities to offer more timely and efficient emergency care hence the need for a modern centre with the state-of-the-art facilities. He said the hospital would collaborate with the National Ambulance Service to ensure that first aid officials would inform the hospital of the conditions of patients before reaching the hospital. Prof. Nartey said communication between first aid officers and doctors would enable doctors to put in place the necessary facilities arid, medicines to attend to patients as soon as they were taken to hospital, stressing that "time is of essence in emergencies". He described last year as very challenging, considering the financial challenges of the hospital occasioned by the global economic downturn. "Another difficulty he noted was the delay in reimbursement to the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHlS) by the government. As a result, he said, the hospital could not pay for the facilities and consumables, and indicated that some of the companies had threatened to sue the hospital. "The CEO said the hospital had outlined a lot of projects this year, including the fixing of 13 new escalators in all the storey buildings at the hospital. He said the management of the hospital had engaged the services of a consultant to improve the scenery of the hospital. Prof. Nartey urged Ghanaians to avoid fatty foods, reduce their intake of starchy foods and exercise regularly. Source: Daily Graphic