Hundreds of outpatients, including cancer patients, are continuing to suffer as a 64 Slice computed tomography (CT) scanner at the San Fernando General Hospital, which went down six months ago, remains dysfunctional.
As the waiting list grows longer, stretching into January 2018, a state of the art CT scanner continues to sit idle at the Couva Children’s and Adult hospital.
On a Facebook post on Monday, cancer survivor and former journalist Phoolo Danny-Maharaj questioned whether Health Minister Terrence Deyalsingh and South West Regional Health Authority (SWRHA) officials were aware the scanner was down for months.
“Is it that it is functional for certain people only? Several patients recently diagnosed with cancer have been sent by doctors to have CT scans to see the extent of the spread of the disease before surgery, but for one reason or another, they are being called the day before the scheduled scan to say the scan is cancelled,” Danny-Maharaj wrote.
She added: “Then a week or two later, they are rescheduled again, only to be cancelled again on the day before the rescheduled scan. Happened today again...seems to me that some officials—higher or lower, are gaining a lot from patients’ sufferings—because alternatively patients have to ‘rake, scrape or borrow’ thousands of dollars to have a scan done at a private institution.”
A medical source said there were two scanners at the hospital—a 64 Slice and a 16 Slice scanner. However, six months ago the 64 Slice scanner went down.
A part which costs $500,000 was being sourced by the SWRHA to fix the scanner but to date it has not been repaired, the official added.
The source said more than 75 scans are done daily between Monday to Friday by the 16 slice scanner. However, these scans are done on in-patients of the hospital, as well as all emergency cases who come through the Accident and Emergency department.
More than 20 outpatients, including cancer victims, go to the hospital for scans but every day at least 10 people are turned away, the source added.
Saying the waiting list for CT-scans is in excess of 600 people, the official said it was imperative the scanner be fixed immediately.
An official also claimed the waiting list for Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scans was also over 600, but although a private hospital offered to do the scans free of charge the offer was rejected by the SWRHA.
The T&T Guardian understands that at a departmental meeting recently, staff was told the offer was rejected “on the grounds that the SWRHA does not have a clear policy on this” and “acceptance of the offer could be interpreted as showing favouritism towards that institution.”
Several attempts contact SWRHA chairman Dr Alexander Sinanan yesterday were unsuccessful as calls to his cell phone went unanswered.
However, in an interview yesterday, Deyalsingh said patients were not affected as there is one functioning scanner at the hospital. He confirmed, however, that the ministry was trying to source a part for the dysfunctional scanner.
“San Fernando has two CT scanners. One is down and the other is working. We are doing routine maintenance and we are looking for a part but everyone is getting a scan because one of the scanners is still working,” Deyalsingh added.
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