A new hospital is set to offer a ground-breaking procedure in the region…
Should you ever be in the position where you need this particular life-saving operation, you’ll soon be able to have it in the comfort of your home country.
A new hospital is opening up in the region, which will specialise in gynaecology, paediatrics, obstetrics, orthopaedics, diabetes and endocrinology.
What’s more, it will offer a service not currently offered in the country – live liver transplants.
The new hospital, located in Dubai Hills within Mohammed bin Rashid City, will open in the last quarter of 2018, and act as a branch of the esteemed King’s College Hospital London in the UK.
HUH, LIVE LIVER TRANSPLANTS?
The 100-bed hospital will be named King’s Dubai, and will offer live liver transplants not only for the UAE but for the entire GCC and Middle East.
If you’re wondering what a live liver transplant is, it’s where a section of liver is removed from a living donor and is used to replace part of a recipient’s damaged liver. The liver from the donor will then grow back over the next few months.
However the hospital will only perform living-related transplants, which means the donor has to related to the patient.
“Though we are just starting off, based on estimates and medical issues such as liver disease and diabetes, we think that we will be carrying out around 40 liver transplants in a year among local patients and those who will travel here,” Simon Fraser, medical director at King’s College Hospital London, told Khaleej Times.
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The move should save patients money, as they’ll no longer need to travel outside the GCC to seek the operation, or related post-operative care.
“Patients here have to spend a lot of money and between three to six months away from home while preparing for the surgery and in after-care. This can all be taken care of in the UAE now,” said Fraser.
Causes for a liver transplant can include organ failure due to hepatitis C, cancer, liver disease and severe infection, among others.
LET’S HEAR MORE ABOUT KING’S DUBAI…
The hospital’s clinical staff, as well as all heads of department and over 30 per cent of the physicians, will be coming from King’s College Hospital London and its partner hospitals in the UK.
As well as the hospital, there will be three additional King’s College Hospital clinics in Dubai, the first of which will open in 2017.
Throughout the hospitals and clinics in the UAE, up to 700 staff will be employed.
An artist’s render of the completed hospital
This isn’t the first time King’s College Hospital London has had ties with Dubai. Back in 1979, HH Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan provided a donation that helped establish the King’s liver research centre, which now lies among the top three in the world.
“Thirty-seven years ago, a very generous and visionary man decided to give thousands of patients another chance at life,” said Professor Nigel Heaton, consultant liver transplant surgeon and director of transplant surgery at King’s Dubai.
“We truly look forward to building on the legacy he started by giving back to this very community through offering local patients in need living-related liver transplants in the near future.”
A symbolic first dig, showing that ground has been broken on the construction of the hospital
Images: Facebook/kchclinics
