AIIMS cancer institute will move to Jhajjar

The cancer institute will be a 600-bed facility,with 200 of the beds dedicated to clinical research and another 200 for palliative care (treatment to relieve the pain in patients who are in advanced stages of cancer).

According to officials,the shift was necessary to expand the existing cancer centre at AIIMS.

Apart from shifting the existing branches of medical,surgical and radiation oncology to the new campus,new centres of nuclear medicine,preventive oncology and psycho-oncology — counselling of cancer patients— will also be set up at the cancer institute in Jhajjar.

Vineet Chawdhry,deputy director of AIIMS,said: “We have presented the proposal to different agencies of the government,including the department of Health Research and the Institute of Family Welfare after getting the green signal from the Planning Commission. We now have to give the financial specifications of the project for approval of the Expenditure Finance Committee (EFC) — the nodal body under the Secretary,Finance.”

The project,estimated to cost around Rs 100 million,will be implemented by the Hospital Services Consultancy Corporation India. The Jhajjar institute will also have a 24X7 cancer emergency,which is currently absent on the AIIMS campus.

Cancer research has been identified as a key responsibility of the outreach campus,so,a research wing,adjoining the dedicated beds for research,will also be set up. Dedicated diagnostic facilities for cancer ranging from pathological analysis of tumour,genetic tests,etc.— that are becoming increasingly important to predict treatment outcomes in cancer — and radiological examination facilities like MRI and X-ray,will be set up.

A senior doctor in IRCH said,“Since we are dependent on the general diagnostic services and surgical facilities in AIIMS,cancer patients have to face inordinately long delays. The new centre should solve these problems.”

A little over a month after the foundation of the Jhajjar campus was laid by Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad,the institute is preparing to start day-long OPDs by October this year,in medicine,paediatrics,ENT,gynaecology,ophthalmology and dermatology to relieve some of the pressure on AIIMS,even as construction on the rest of the campus continues.

Unlike other community centres run by AIIMS,Jhajjar campus will be managed entirely by AIIMS specialists without taking any support from doctors attached to the state governments.

“We have hired over a 100 specialists,so there will be no shortage of doctors on the main campus,while our doctors tend to patients in Jhajjar. We expect 800-1,000 patients every day in Jhajjar and unlike the AIIMS OPD,which only operates for the first half of the day,the Jhajjar OPD will work through the day,” said Chawdhry.

The OPD,to be built in an area of 4,000 sqm,will operate from 10 am to 5 pm from Monday to Saturday and will also have a minor operation theatre,plaster room,two X- ray and ultrasound machines,and lab facilities.

“Two buses will be operated from AIIMS every morning to bring doctors here. We will also have visiting specialists in branches like nephrology and urology as per the need of patients,” said M Rastogi,executive engineer.