ISLAMABAD: Children’s Emergency Response Centre at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) has been renovated and the area expanded to 5,000 square feet, raising the capacity of beds from 12 to 30.

Talking to mediapersons who were especially invited to the centre, the hospital’s director, Dr Khalid Masood, said the facility was renovated under public-private partnership (PPP) initiative.

“The emergency response area has been expanded with the cooperation of the Child Life Foundation (CLF) which has replicated its emergency care model in Islamabad,” he said.

Speaking on the occasion, CLF General Manager Communications Shahzad Zaki said the foundation had been providing free emergency care and consultation to children across Sindh, Balochistan and Punjab for the last 11 years.

“This year we have achieved a milestone by modernising the children emergency response (ER) centre at Pims.

The impact of this ER will be huge as it will serve underprivileged children not only in the capital territory and Punjab but also from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Gilgit-Baltistan,” he said.

Mr Zaki said the CLF had so far saved 4.5 million children absolutely free of cost through its 12 state-of-the-art children’s emergency rooms in Sindh, Balochistan and Punjab. The organisation aims to cover every district of every province by 2030, he said.

Meanwhile, the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) chairman, Tauseef H. Farooqi, also visited the emergency room at Pims and praised the paperless, automated model of care implemented.

“I came to know about the CLF’s cause under Nepra’s power with prosperity initiative. Now that I have witnessed their work, I am quite impressed,” he said.

The upgraded children’s ER at Pims started treating children from August 2022. The CLF has implemented the WHO-recommended emergency triage system and placed life-saving medical equipment and over 100 trained healthcare staff in the ER while qualified pharmacists are also available 24/7 to dispense free medicines to critical patients.

Published in Dawn, August 25th, 2022