ISLAMABAD: The bone marrow transplant centre at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) is being run by the staff provided by a non-governmental organisation for the last about eight years.

Moreover, work on the phase II of the centre has been delayed.

On Thursday, Minister of State for Capital Administration and Development Division (CADD) Barrister Usman Ibrahim took notice of the situation and directed that work on the project of the hematology and bone marrow transplant centre should be expedited.

Chairing a meeting, the minister said: “We cannot delay the project anymore as bone marrow transplant is one of the essential modalities and in some cases the only curative treatment for blood diseases, including thalassaemia and leukaemia.”

He said getting new and modern equipment, hiring qualified medical staff along with the space/land for the centre were his priority.

The total cost of the project is Rs175 million - Rs100 million to be funded by the Italian government and the remaining amount to be provided by the government of Pakistan.

The project was launched in the fiscal year 2013-2014. Initially, Rs10 million were released by the Planning Commission followed by Rs33.344 million for the fiscal year 2014-15. Equipment worth Rs10 million have already been procured.

Pims is the only public tertiary care hospital providing bone marrow transplantation to the underprivileged people. But the centre is only capable of carrying out 30 transplants per year because of the capacity issue as its PC II is yet to be approved.

Besides Pims, there are only three private health institutes offering bone marrow transplant in the country - the Armed Forces Bone Marrow Transplant Centre, Rawalpindi, the National Institute of Blood Diseases and the Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi. There is no public health institute to offer this facility, so making the centre a part of Pims would be a sigh of relief for the patients.

Barrister Ibrahim directed the officials to prepare a summary and get the project approved from the Planning Commission as soon as possible.

Pims Vice Chancellor Dr Javed Akram while talking to Dawn said though the centre was established eight years ago, only 95 transplants had carried out in the centre.

“We have 85 per cent success rate. Funding is required for the phase II because only that is how capacity of the centre will be increased,” he said.

“Currently, 39-member staff is working at the centre but all of them have been hired by an NGO. After approval of the PC II, posts will be advertised and permanent staff will be appointed.

However, the staff currently working at the centre can also be considered because they have the experience of eight years,” he said.

Published in Dawn, October 31st, 2014