Hajaratu and her mother are back from Egypt’s Aswan Heart Centre. Surgery was successful and she is enjoying her new heart.
They came by Pikin Bizness Office to show their gratitude Another joint partnership with Chain of Hope and RCPCH. The Magdi Yacoub Heart Centre, Aswan, Egypt Samar Al-Najjar. The Magdi Yacoub Foundation for Cardiac Diseases and Research was founded by surgeon Magdi Yacoub in Aswan to provide free medical services at the highest level to Egyptians, particularly less fortunate children. The foundation also aims to train young doctors and nurses in accordance with the highest international medical standards and to develop research in the field of basic, applied and biomedical sciences (including genetics, proteins and food metabolism).
The most important goals of the centre are to create a new generation of heart surgeons trained at the highest level, and at the same time to provide medical services to the largest possible number of patients. The centre management has worked on increasing the number of doctors working with the Surgery Department by 35 percent in 2013, compared to 2012. Ahmed Hanafy, the director of the centre; which located next to Aswan Teaching Hospital, says that the building and the land on which the centre is located belongs to Aswan University Hospital, but the centre has the right to use it for 30 years. “We receive dozens of cases daily, but we only have 60 beds and 28 rooms (14 for adults and 14 for children),” he said.
“We conducted 723 surgeries in 2013, at a 51 percent increase compared to 2012; 51 percent of which were for children,” Hanafy added. The total number of surgical operations conducted between the establishment of the centre in April 2009 and March 2014 is 2,180 surgeries, according to Hanafy. Hanafy said approximately 25,000 children annually are born with heart disease in Egypt. Only 6,000 were treated in hospitals last year, he added. This statistic concerns children only, but we nonetheless have a major crisis on our hands due to the growing number of heart patients in Egypt, Hanafy maintained. According to statistics compiled between 2009 and 2013, the Open Heart Surgery department contains two wings equipped at the highest international standards, two wings for intensive care and one children’s wing. The children’s wing contains 10 beds to receive post-surgery patients, particularly those that are in complex and critical situations. There is another suite for adults, which contains 13 beds. The inpatient department contains 28 beds, 14 for children and 14 for adults. The inpatient section for children houses activities and games for children and is designed with bright colours to minimize the negative psychological impacts surgery can have on children. There are also two suites that include nine beds for the after cardiac catheter surgery care. In 2013, 1,278 catheter surgeries were conducted, at an increase of 56 percent compared to 2012.
The total number of diagnostic and therapeutic cardiac catheterizations carried out at the Magdi Yacoub Center between the beginning of April 2009 and March 2014 is 3,655, mostly from Aswan and the southern region of Upper Egypt. The number of walk-in patients at the Heart Department’s outpatient clinic stood at 7,088 in 2013, including both children and adults; an increase of 30 percent compared to 2012.