Mammoth Ventures in Progress
QR 3.8 bn. Earmarked for the Health Sector

     HH Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani issued an Emiri de­cision, on 4th April, 2006, en­dorsing the State’s general bud­get of the fiscal year 1st April, 2006 to 31st March, 2007, the biggest budget Qatar has so far witnessed.
     The major portion of such bud­get was allocated for the ex­ecution of mammoth and pivotal projects such as edu­cation, health, housing and in­fra­struc­ture ventures which have been granted the lion’s share in this budget.
     The health sector has got QR 3.8 billion of which QR 629 million has been allocated for Hamad Medical City, the con­struction of the South Area Hospital, ex­pansion of NAH, es­tab­lishment of new health cen­ters and ex­pansion works in HGH and Rumailah Hos­pi­tal.
      Moreover, this year shall witness the initiation of work in a num­ber of vital health ven­tures in different areas of the State such as: Al Wakrah Hos­pi­tal, which shall kick-off in July 2006 and the Medical Tower (Heart Center) which shall be completed by the end of the year.

 

     On the other hand, the Pub­lic Works Authority has, re­cently, fi­nalized the nec­essary designs for a to­tal of new fourteen (14) Emergency Centers; two of them at the cost of QR 44 million in Al Gharafa and Mireikh. The Au­thority has also fi­nalized the de­sign of three (3) Health Centers with full fa­cilities, in diffe-rent areas of the State.

Qatar ranked first in the Middle East as to volume of national ex­pen­di­ture on the health sector

     The last annual report issued by World Health Organization (WHO) highlighted Qatar as the highest ex­pender on health services in the Middle East, while the United Arab Emirates (UAE) came in the 2nd place, Kuwait in the 3rd and Bahrain in the 4th place. Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) ranked 5th and Oman ranked 6th, while Somalia came in the last place as per WHO annual report.
      The report showed that the av­erage national health expenditure per capita in the State of Qatar amounted to US$ 935 approxi­ mately, while this reached about US$ 812 in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), US$ 547 in Kuwait, US$ 517 in Bahrain, US$ 345 in Saudi Arabia, US$ 246 in Oman, US$ 6 in Somalia, US$ 11 in Iraq, and US$ 17 in Pakistan.

 

HMC Managing Di­rector, Turki Al Khater, on the occasion of World’s Health Day
Qatar is pro­viding high quality health services under the pa­tronage and support of HH the Emir”

     The state of Qatar joined other world nations in cel­ebrating the World’s Health Day, 7th April every year. The celebration this year took place in the at­mo­sphere of the tre­men­dous boom and over­whelming de­vel­opment in the field of health services wit­nessed by the country, with the per­spective that human is a precious na­tional wealth, hence should be given all due care and concern.
      Mr. Turki Mohammed Al Khater, HMC Managing Director, made an announcement, on this occasion, em­pha­sizing that Qatar is cel­ebrating the World’s Health Day, this year, in coincidence with the mag­nifi­cent achievements realized in the health sector and the ongoing giant projects in the same field, such as Hamad Medical City Project.
      “The state of Qatar, under the wise leadership of HH the Emir, Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani and HH the Heir apparent, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, is vowing to pro­vide high quality health services, by the hands of highly com­pe­tent local and in­ter­na­tional medical cadres, and through the in­tro­duction of the state-of-the-art tech­nologies in the field of medical care” Mr. Al Khater noted, adding that the excellence achieved in this field, which Hamad Medical Corporation has the lion’s share of it, is considered a real indication of human development in Qatar.


 

      HE Turki Al Khater, the Mana- ging Director of HMC and HE Dr. Sheikha Al Misnad, the President of the Uni­ver­sity of Qatar (QU) opened the fair, jointly organized by HMC’s Pub­lic Relations De­partment and Projects & Management Sys­tems, un­der the theme “Health is a Grace from God”, at QU, on the 10th-13th of April 2006.
    Following the opening cer­emony of the fair, Mr. Al Khater, the Mana-ging Di­rector of HMC con­firmed, in a press release, that the HMC, being the sole public healthcare pro­vider in the State, strives to pro­mote its health and awareness message, in particular among the youth in their edu­ca­tional institutions, social and sports clubs, youth centers… etc. adding that the objective of “Health is a Grace from God” fair is to in­crease Qatar Uni­ver­sity stu­dents’ knowl­edge and awareness on the causes and pre­vention of the various dis­eases, edu­cating them on the per­ils of road traffic acci­dents (RTA), efforts ex­erted by HMC to curb the dra­matic in­crease in rate of RTA along with the re­ha­bili­tation pro­grams adopted by the Cor­po­ration for the vic­tims of RTA.
    It worth noting that a number of HMC’s therapeutic and ad­min­is­trative Hospitals and De­partments, in­cluding Al Ammal Hos­pi­tal, Psy­chia­try De­partment, Media De­partment, HIS, Smoke Stop Clinic, Organs Trans­plan­tation Committee, Cardiology & Car­dio­vas­cu­lar Sur­gery De­partment (CCS), Labo­ratory De­partment Plas­tic Surgery Section, Phys­io­therapy Section, Ophthalmology Section and Pediatric Emergency Cen­ter have all par­tici­pated in the fair to en­lighten the students and ac­quaint them with the ac­tivities and the im­por­tant role they are playing in serving the benefits and interests of the community.

HMC participates in the Second Annual Vocational Day of North Atlantic College-Qatar

     The HMC participated in the ac­tivities of the three-days second annual vo­ca­tional day hosted by North Atlantic College-Qatar opened on 3rd April 2006 at the College pre­mises. HE Sheikh Abdullah Bin Mohammed Bin Sauod Al Thani, Chairman of the College Board of Trust­ees, accom­pa­nied by Dr. Latifa Al Houty, Chair­per­son of HMC Board of Di­rectors, toured the Cor­po­ration stand collateral to this event, where he has been ac­quainted with the various ac­tivities of the Cor­po­ration along with the on going un­der con­struction therapeutic schemes. Dr. Al Houty, using a illus­trative re­lief map, gave a brief re­sume about Hamad Medical City.
     Moreover, HMC’s stand has, also, included a pre­sen­tation for the re­markable training oppor­tu­nities pro­vided by the Cor­po­ration for both male and fe­male Qatari na­tionals to study in North At­lan­tic College-Qatar and con­se­quently get prof­itable jobs in the State’s health sector. Furthermore, the stand com­prised a number of brochures and pub­li­cations, issued by the Media De­partment of HMC, which shed the light on the current ac­tivities of the Cor­po­ration and its future am­bitious plans. In the meantime, other De­partments and Sections of HMC, such as the De­partments of Personnel Affairs, Public Re­lations, En­gi­neering, Health In­for­mation Ser­vices (HIS), and Trans­ports Section have all con­trib­

    The Hamad Medical Cor­po­ration has launched the sec­ond stage of Qatar’s Pro­gram for Early De­tection of New­borns’ he­redi­tary dis­ease, which HMC is applying in co­op­eration with Germany’s Heidel­berg Uni­ver­sity Clinics.
     “Qatar is the third coun­try in the whole world to apply this pro­gram, after Ger­many and Aus­tra­lia” Mr. Ahmad Abdullah Al Mazrouee, Di­rector of HMC Projects and Man­agement Sys­tems De­partment, de­clared at a press con­ference held on March 20, 2006, which was wit­nessed by, head of the pro­gram, Dr. Helal Amin Tawfiq Al Rifai, Director of NICU and chief of staff at Women’s Hos­pi­tal, in addition to Dr. George Huffman, chairman of Pediatrics De­partment, Heidel­berg University Clinics, Dr. Ghassan Mostafa, the assis­tant head of the program and Ms. Belqees Al Khazragi, pro­grams co­or­di­nator of PMS De­partment.
     “The early detection cam­paign currently being launched covers 25 he­redi­tary dis­eases, en­abling early treatment and pre­ventive measures, that safe­guard against fu­ture com­pli­cations, which in some cases lead to mental or physical disabil­ity” Dr. Helal Al Rifai noted.
    “The number of he­redi­tary dis­eases to be early de­tected through this am­bitious pro­gram will in­crease to 27, as two more diseases were re­cently discovered” said Dr. Huffman, adding that blood samples of about 20,000 new­born babies (60% of them are Qataris) have been ex­am­ined since the kick­off of the pro­gram. De­spite the fact that only 25 cases were found to be suffering from hor­monal of meta­bolic dis­eases, but this rate is con­sid­ered to be more than that of Ger­many.
     Finally, Dr. Huffman urged GCC countries to adopt this program, being a tre­men­dous health service to be pro­vided for protection of future generations against hereditary diseases.