Port Moresby General Hospital (PMGH) Kidney Dialysis Centre is progressing with eight machines purchased and awaiting engineers for installation.
Hospital CEO Dr. Paki Molumi, revealed this during the World Kidney Day observance at the PNG Kidney Foundation (PNGKF) base in the nation’s capital on Friday 04th of March.
COVID-19 restrictions have delayed the arrival of engineers from overseas to set up the Kidney Dialysis equipment at the Port Moresby General Hospital. However hospital CEO Dr. Paki Molumi said the partnership with the National Fisheries Authority will ensure the equipment is up and working as soon as possible.
“Kidney is a very important organ in our body and as we move towards changing our lifestyle, eating different processed food, lack of exercise, diabetes, that will affect the kidney, so as Papua New Guineans are going into that kind of modern lifestyle, the lifestyle diseases are increasing and kidney is one of them,” Dr. Molumi said.
Dr. Molumi said they have to start building up the facilities, and train the appropriate human resource to be able to manage increasing lifestyle diseases, especially in the kidney.
Under the government policy through the National Health Plan, PMGH will be at level 6. It will be the specialist referral and research hospital for the country. In that regard PMGH has started elevating its capacity to perform at a higher level.
“That means those kind of services that you go to Singapore and you get, you go to Philippines or you go overseas to receive. So we will be providing those kind of services at the PMGH, we’ve already started with cardiac providing the intervention cardiology procedures like catlab, now we are going into stoke reversals and of course stenting all the other organs as well including kidney,” Dr. Molumi added.
PMGH in partnership with the PNGKF have trained a kidney specialist in Dr. Steven Bogosia. Dr Bogosia was trained in Malaysia as a qualified Nephrologist.
“So he’s travelling around the country assisting in facilitating the MOUs that are signed with the PNG Kidney Foundation, with Mendi hospital Dr. Birisi, CEO of SH PHA so they’re setting up a kidney dialysis centre there, of course Sir Martin has just announced the East New Britain,” he said.