The beneficiary effects of help desk 

The ‘Help Desk’ at MNJ Institute of Oncology has yielded encouraging results in the last six months of its operation. The announcement came from Dr N Jayalata, Director of the MNJ Cancer Hospital on Sunday.

• Significant drop in patient complaints in last six months
• Hospital gets new Litho Stirrup for Laparoscopic surgeries in Cancer

“We have three desks installed at the State Cancer hospital; one at outpatient section, which gets about 80 – 100 patients daily and almost 50 per cent of them approach the ‘Desk’ for guidance.

The second desk is placed near the Radiology unit, where patients come for CT, MRI and Ultra Sound Scans and again close to 60 – 70 patients approach it regularly. The last desk is placed near the Pathology Lab where more than 100 patients approach for guidance,” said Dr Jayalata about the functioning of the help desks.

A vast majority of patients who come to the Hospital are from the districts of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh and also from neighbouring States of Karnataka and Maharashtra. “This segment of the patients needs a lot of guidance on availing facilities at the Hospital; counsellors at the help desks are promptly guiding and them to their satisfaction,” said the doctor.

The help desk service was started through an MoU between Helping Hand Foundation (HHF) and MNJ Institute of Oncology and Regional Cancer centre in March as part of a private public partnership initiative.

The other critical function of aimed thru the ‘Help Desk’ was to de fray expenses of poor patients and Helping Hand Foundation has in the last 6 months de frayed expenses of nearly 75 poor cancer patients, expenses typically involved purchase of blood, charges for MRI and CT Scan, food and transportation said Mr. Mujtaba Hasan Askari, President of HHF.

Further Mr. Askari added that the NGO spends Rs 45,000/- per month as expenses in running the desk and reiterates that such ‘Help Desk’ in other territiary government hospitals, must be seriously considered by the government to improve the confidence of the public in the public health institutions.

Towards sophisticated surgeries

The MNJ Cancer Hospital has added a Litho stirrup, a tabletop accessory for laparoscopic surgeries. “Each month it performs about 40 – 50 laparoscopic surgeries for cancers,” informed Dr Ramesh Maturi, Laparoscopic Surgical Oncologist at MNJ Cancer Hospital.

“The litho stirrup allows a surgeon to place a patient’s legs in ergonomically correct position, so that laparoscopic surgeries can be done without harming the nerves of patient, when done in extreme positions taken in lap surgeries and further laparoscopy allows very quick recovery for patients and almost no pain from major cancer surgeries. Patients get discharged in two to three days,” said the doctor.