Magnetic Resonance Imaging Machine For '37' Hosp. Soon

A machine to diagnose patients with spinal trauma, seizure activities and a wide range of unexplained loss of consciousness will soon be operational at the 37 Military Hospital in Accra. 

A sod-cutting ceremony to install the two million dollar-machine, which will be the third of its kind in West Africa, was performed last Friday by the Defence Minister, Albert Kan-Dapaah. It is being funded by Fidelity Bank.

Currently, Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital and another in Nigeria are the only hospitals in West Africa with the equipment called Magnetic Resonance Imaging Machine (MRI).

Performing the ceremony, Mr Kan-Dapaah said the installation of the machine would save the country huge sums of money, paid for medical evacuations to Europe, America and South Africa.

He said the MRI would as well make highly defined images of soft tissue, diagnose diseases which did not appear to be stroke induced.

The Minister said that the government had concluded negotiations for the construction of a 500-bed Military Hospital, including residential accommodation for health workers in Kumasi in the Ashanti Region, and added that Parliament had approved the facility, for work to start soon.

Touching on the problems of the 37 Military Hospital, he said, medical equipment installed in 1992 had become obsolete, adding that Parliament had been notified of the situation.

He expressed the hope that Parliament would approve a 38-million Euro facility by the end of this week to supply and install other medical and technical equipment in the hospital to ensure quality healthcare delivery.

Mr Kan-Dapaah advised workers of the hospital to ensure proper maintenance of whatever equipment had been installed at the hospital saying, “it is our collective responsibility to protect and maintain the MRI machine”.