Gov't to release P742M to upgrade facilities in Heart Center, Lung Center, PCMC

MANILA, Philippines - Racing time to make up for the underspending in the first half of the year, the Aquino administration will release P742 million to upgrade medical facilities and services in three government hospitals.

Budget Secretary Florencio Abad said yesterday the government would be upgrading the facilities and services at the Philippine Heart Center (PHC), the Lung Center of the Philippines (LCP) and the Philippine Children’s Medical Center (PCMC).

“This fund release will support necessary upgrading of our specialty hospitals so that citizens, especially the poor and the marginalized, will have access to safe and effective healthcare services,” Abad said.

Of the P742 million, the Philippine Health Center would be getting P357 million for the upgrade of its aging infrastructure and medical equipment.

The fund will also finance capital outlay projects of the hospital, particularly the renovation of the existing recovery room into two operating rooms for pediatric interventional procedures; conversion of the medical intensive care unit (MICU) into a surgical intensive care unit room; purchase of additional cardiac catherization laboratory; and purchase of additional echocardiography machines.

The P105 million, meanwhile, will support two important programs of the Lung Center of the Philippines particularly the P70-million Bio-Regenerative Program which seeks to harness stem cell research and technology to treat cancer patients and the P35-million Pediatric Pulmonary Program for children aged three months to 18 years of age who are afflicted with lung diseases.

The Philippine Children’s Medical Center will get the remaining P280 million for the capital and equipment renovation project for its outmoded facilities.

The amount will be used to renovate and rehabilitate the 30-year old outdated building, expand facilities to serve more patients and replace outmoded equipment for accurate diagnoses.

The fund will be sourced from government savings last year and in 2011.