LAHORE, Sept 25: The government has acquired after ‘prolonged negotiations’ the latest version of the PCR machine to facilitate patients coming to Lahore from all over the province.
The Polymerase Chain Reaction machine is an essential equipment for health facilities to conduct tests and also helps the students pursuing research programmes.
Purchased under the King Edward Medical University’s Advanced Lab and Diagnostic Centre, the Real Time PCR machine – Q Tower -- had been made functional for both diagnosis and advanced researches after its test run of two weeks, a source told Dawn. He said the PCR tests were not being done free of cost as the administration was charging between Rs800 and 1,200 from the patients. The same PCR test was available at the private hospitals and laboratories between Rs4,000 and 10,000, the source said.
However, in order to ensure free PCR tests for the deserving patients, the KEMU management had asked the higher authorities to immediately provide a separate PCR machine for the attached Mayo Hospital to help dengue patients visiting the health facility for diagnosis.
Jinnah Hospital is the only public health institution in Lahore, which has been accommodating a large number of patients for the facility. The patients have to wait for hours to submit blood samples and even months to get results of PCR analysis.
Major institutions like Services, Sir Ganga Ram and Lahore General hospitals are without this facility even though dengue has assumed dreaded proportions and there are many other viral diseases.
KEMU Vice-Chancellor Prof Dr Asad Aslam told Dawn that one of the major beneficiaries of the facility would be MPhil and PhD students of the varsity, who conducted research through PCR genetic analysis.
“The newly-installed PCR machine is the latest version which has the potential to accurately and quickly diagnose diseases,” said Prof Asad.
Meanwhile, the Young Doctors Association Pakistan has pointed out institutional failure, claiming the KEMU has another RT PCR machine at the Pathology Department but not a single hepatitis test has been done through it since its installation on Jan 23, 2010.
Dr Salman Kazmi, Dr Rana Sohail and Dr Talha Sherwani say poor hepatitis patients have been forced to visit to the private laboratories to get their test done despite the availability of machine at the KEMU lab.
The KEMU vice chancellor said the machine was donated by the National Institute of Health, Islamabad under an agreement that the equipment would be used for only influenza analysis. He said the NIH had imparted training to the doctors and other staff with strict directions that influenza tests would be carried out under the National Influenza Surveillance Program (NISP) for five years. And the period would be extendable to another five years, he added.