TAXILA: The Attock district on Friday got its first ‘field hospital’ aimed at providing essential healthcare services to the rural population.

Deputy Commissioner Attock Rao Atif Raza inaugurated the first field hospital of the district in village Shadi Khan in Hazro on Friday.

Speaking at the inauguration ceremony as chief guest, the deputy commissioner said that field hospitals were for the areas where big hospital or good clinic did not exist.

”It is a complete hospital equipped with all the basic facilities available in any good clinic,” he said. He was of the view that field hospitals would play a pivotal role in providing essential healthcare coverage to rural areas with limited healthcare resources.

He said 32 field hospitals — 21 mobile healthcare units and 11 small field hospitals comprising mobile diagnostic units — were being deployed in rural areas of Punjab to expand the healthcare coverage.

He said the field hospital was equipped with all necessary facilities and would move to remote areas to provide services where no health facilities are available. The DC said that this initiative aimed at improving access to medical services.

Briefing the participants, assistant commissioner Hazro Kamran Ashraf said the field hospitals were built in a large container equipped with adequate medical facilities like ECG, advanced X-ray, laboratory tests and medicines to the people of the remote rural areas.

Published in Dawn, May 18th, 2024