The All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) is set to spruce up its dialysis facility. Presently dialysis is conducted on 70 patients daily. But the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has issued an advisory to the institute stating that dialysis be conducted on 150 patients daily, keeping in mind the increase in number of patients.
Since 1989, AIIMS has had only 13 dialysis machines installed at its nephrology department. Authorities are planning to install two more dialysis machines to tide over the current crisis.
On August 16, a letter was sent by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare seeking explanation on the number of dialysis machines available at the hospital and number of patients undergoing daily dialysis at the facility.
The letter mentioned that they were in receipt of complaints from patients in dire need of a renal transplant but were forced to undergo dialysis at private institutes.
According to statistics by AIIMS, around 5.4 lakh patients require kidney transplant every year, but only 6,000 are able to get it. The rest either survive on dialysis — which, in simple terms, means removing waste and excess water from the blood and used primarily as an artificial replacement for lost kidney function in cases of renal failure — or die without a transplant.
DK Sharma, medical superintendent, AIIMS, said that as far as installation of adequate number of dialysis machines is concerned, expansion of existing facilities and creation of new facilities at the institute is a continuous process taken up in accordance with the requirement and availability of funds.