Region’s largest heart and cancer centre to be ready next year

The construction of the region’s largest specialist heart and cancer centre at The Aga Khan Hospital, Nairobi, is on schedule.

The centre will open on time in the second quarter of next year.

The heart and cancer centre will treat patients from the wider east African region, as well as central and southern Africa.

It will also serve as a teaching facility for the Aga Khan University Hospital.

The hospital, which already offers post-graduate training, will roll out its undergraduate programme in three years, in 2012.

Among the facilities at the three-storey centre will be a six-bed cardio-thoracic surgical intensive care unit and a similar number of coronary care units.

Institutions that are cooperating with the centre include Canada’s Alberta Heart Clinic, St Thomas and Guys Hospital, UK, the University of Liverpool and Rishospitalet, Norway.

“In addition to providing high quality tertiary cardiac and cancer care, the centre will be a platform for scientific research and post-graduate sub-speciality fellowship training,” said the university hospital in a statement.

Last week, the university hospital announced the appointment of Professor Nicholas Abinya — a respected cancer specialist — as head of cancer services at the centre.

This is part of recruitment efforts to launch the new centre.

Prof Abinya previously worked at Kenyatta National Hospital, the largest public facility in the region, and at the Royal London Hospital, UK.

Kenyatta is the only public hospital in Kenya with dedicated heart and cancer treatment facilities.