A K1 billion Children’s Accident and Emergency Anadkat Centre, which has been constructed by the Anadkat Family, has officially been opened at Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital in Blantyre.
The Children’s Accident and Emergency Anadkat Centre which has cost the First Capital Bank founder Hitesh Anadkat and his family over One Billion Kwacha, has been officially opened on Friday, November 24, 2023 at a ceremony which drew together health authorities including minister of health Khumbize Kandodo Chiponda.
Speaking at the event, Kandodo Chiponda who was the guest of honour, commended the Anadkat Family for sacrificing their personal funds to help give the health facility a new face and thereby putting a smile on Malawian children and the staff working at the institution.
The minister further said the Children’s Accident and Emergency Anadkat Centre is set to provide special life-saving treatment to children and reduce congestion at the main Accident and Emergency Unit at the referral facility, thereby reducing paediatric deaths at the institution and Malawi at large.
“The fact of the matter is that the majority of avoidable paediatric deaths occur in the first 24 hours of their reporting to the hospital and this is due to inadequate resuscitation or triage as the patients come in.
“The rehabilitation of this Children’s Accident and Emergency Unit has provided facilities to improve triage and resuscitation, which is an important ingredient for the hospital to manage very sick patients earlier and adequately and so reduce paediatric deaths. The procedure room will allow management of various forms of trauma and injuries so that avoidable suffering, disabilities and deaths are prevented,” said Chiponda.
While reiterating government’s commitment to improving emergency services in the country, Chiponda said her Ministry and various health experts were last week during the National Trauma Consultative Forum, brainstorming on how trauma can be prevented and how, in the event of trauma events, lives can be saved in Malawi.
In their remarks, the Anadkat family, through Meeta, said their family was convinced to fund the project after seeing how inadequate it was when they visited the facility to appreciate the situation when a certain charity group requested for a donation of 40 million kwacha to refurbish small sections of the Children’s Accident and Emergency ward five years ago.
The family said it has always been so painful for them to be seeing children at the hospital and the country at large suffering and dying as a result of inadequate equipment and facilities to provide for their care, hence the conviction to fund the construction of the unit.
“Naturally, Hitesh and I decided to visit the hospital to meet the dedicated Dr Jo and to see the work that needed to be done. What we saw was shocking! As soon as we walked into the building, we were struck by how dark, humid and chaotic it was! Things proceeded from bad to worse.
“We were met by 2 sets of grieving families. The first family had just lost their child in the resuscitation room and the second family had just learned that their child being brought in an ambulance had died! As every mother can tell you, we live with the constant fear that something terrible might happen to our child.
“That day, we witnessed the pain and heartbreak of 2 mothers that had lost their children. Words themselves cannot do justice to describe the state of a woman who has just been told that her beautiful child is no more. Our hearts sank! The sad reality that most Malawians endure was laid bare right in front of our eyes. We toured the facility and realized how inadequate it really was,” narrated Meeta.
She then implored doctors and nurses at the facility to cherish and maintain the improvements and added that it is imperative that they all uphold the standards set and continue to provide the highest level of care to those who depend on them.
The facility whose walls are beautifully clad with hand painted murals, comprises several modern treatment areas that include a triage area, where children are assessed upon arrival and depending on the nature of the case, treatment is provided in one of the many private rooms.
Adjacent to the seating area, is a newly built and functioning high dependency unit (HDU), which is a breath of fresh air to both, patients and clinical staff alike.
Alongside that, there is the children’s mortuary, one of its kind, which was built and designed with careful detail and thought, such as the memorable wall mural that provides a semblance of much needed calm during the loss of a child.
This is not the first project in the emergency medical services that the Anadkat family has supported at QECH as they are also on record to have assisted the refurbishment of the adults’ Accidents and Emergency and Trauma Centre and they also built the doctors’ hostel at Kamuzu University of Health Science (KUHeS).
Apart from that, the Anadkat family has also previously paid school fees for more than 500 needy students in tertiary, provided K200 million support for cyclone Freddy survivors, as well as the construction of 472 bed prison block just to mention a few.
