JOIN USKidwai to treat patients from African country soon
Attesting the quality of health care in state-owned hospitals, a faraway country from Central Africa has evinced interest in the Kidwai Memorial Institute of Oncology (KMIO), to treat its citizens ailing from various cancers.
Boosting the prospects of medical tourism among government hospitals, the KMIO is all set to ink an MoU with the Republic of Burundi — a landlocked country in Central Africa to treat its cancer patients.
Last week, the representatives from Burundi, accompanied by the officials of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), visited the institute and were apprised about the facilities and services the hospital provides.
“Burundi representatives explained us about the dearth of specialised cancer care facilities in their country, due to which they are keen on sending cancer patients to India for treatment at government-run hospitals,” a medical officer at KMIO explained.
Giving the details of the visit, Dr C Ramachandra, Director of KMIO said: “Even though Burundi is closer to the Middle-Eastern countries and other leading cities in Africa, the treatment in Bengaluru is far affordable for the people and hence evinced interest in us.”
According to him, the signing of the memorandum of understanding would facilitate the sending of patients from Burundi to the KMIO.
Docs to visit Burundi
“It is proposed that the Burundi government will send patients to Kidwai and bear the travel and treatment expenses of the patients. This apart, the doctors from Bengaluru will also visit Burundi, and hold camps to interact with patients and refer them for advanced treatment in Bengaluru. We are expecting about 500 patients from Burundi in a year,” he explained.
The KMIO plans to treat these patients in a special ward set aside to treat overseas patients.
“The charges will be higher than what is being charged for BPL or Arogya Karnataka patients. The money earned in treating overseas patients will be used to treat the poor here,” Dr Ramachandra explained.