Building work on a new dialysis unit at Paphos general hospital will start at the end of this year and is expected to be completed within 30 months, head of the nephrology department Lakis Gioukas said on Monday.
The construction of the unit was the result of a meeting held at Paphos hospital attended by Gioukas, the director of the hospital Spyros Georgiou and representatives of state health services Okypy, the health ministry and the department of public works.
Tenders are expected to be completed by the end of October, Gioukas explained, adding it is going to be a modern European-standard unit for renal patients.
It will be constructed on an area of about 860 metres and will have 27 hemodialysis stations, a peritoneal dialysis ward, a ward for minor surgeries and outpatient facilities.
It will be housed in a building next to the ICU.
There has been great interest by private constructors and Health Minister Constantinos Ioannou for the project, the head of the nephrology department said.
For years, there have been calls for a new dialysis unit at the state hospital as there has been an urgent need for more dialysis machines to keep up with demand.
Dialysis patients have held numerous protests, complaining about overcrowding at the existing unit. They warned there are health and safety risks, the beds are too close to each other and they are catching germs and diseases from each other.
