Tarun Karthick
Campbell Bay, 12 May 2023
Andaman & Nicobar Administration has established a Dialysis unit at Primary Health Centre, Swaraj Dweep which was virtually inaugurated on 11th May 2023, by Mr. Keshav Chandra, IAS, Chief Secretary, A & N Administration. The unit has two machines and will be managed by one Medical Officer trained in Dialysis and one Dialysis technician under the supervision of a physician trained in Dialysis through Telemedicine. This will bring great relief to six patients of Chronic Kidney disease who had to travel by boat from Swaraj Dweep twice or thrice a week to undergo Dialysis at G.B.Pant Hospital, Port Blair. It will also provide an opportunity to tourists suffering from Chronic Kidney Disease and are on regular maintenance haemodialysis to undergo Dialysis during their stay at Swaraj Dweep, which has become one of the most sought after tourist destinations in our country. Last year six tourists availed this facility at G.B. Pant Hospital, Port Blair.
With the establishment of a Dialysis unit at Swaraj Dweep, the Primary Health Centre has achieved a rare distinction of being the only Primary Health Centre in our country to have a dialysis unit. The unit will be registered under PMNDP (Prime Minister National Dialysis Programme) and will provide Dialysis free of cost to all patients as being practised in other Dialysis units in these Islands.
Under the PMNDP the Andaman & Nicobar Islands have Dialysis units in all three District Hospitals in Port Blair, Mayabunder and Car Nicobar as well as in three Community Health Centres in Diglipur, Rangat and Bambooflat, providing free of cost Dialysis facility to 209 patients suffering from Chronic Kidney Disease. The total number of Dialysis Machines in these Islands being 36.
In his inaugural address, the Chief Secretary congratulated the team of Health Department for the achievement and urged the patients suffering from Diabetes and Hypertension, the two most common causes of Chronic Kidney Disease, to get themselves screened at regular interval in order to detect the development of Chronic Kidney Disease at the earliest and delay its progression to end stage Kidney Disease requiring dialysis.