The Paediatric Critical Care Unit (PICU) at the Georgetown Public Hospital was officially declared open yesterday by the Minister of Public Health, Volda Lawrence, the Department of Public Information (DPI) said.
The unit has been in the pipeline for almost three years but was fast-tracked after visits were made by the minister and the Parliamentary Sectoral Committee on Social Services, DPI said. The 16-bed High Dependency and Intensive Care Unit will serve critically ill children under the age of thirteen and will periodically house congenital heart diseases patients, regardless of age, who underwent surgical procedures compliments of the International Children’s Heart Foundation.
Dr. Rodrigo Soto, Paediatric Cardiac Surgeon of the International Children Heart Foundation (ICHF), said the critical care unit is the first of its kind in Guyana.
“For the first twelve months it will be basically what we call a High Dependency Unit, which means that every patient that requires special care after surgery, any surgery not only cardiac, or any critically ill patient will be able to be taken care of here with the proper equipment and with the physicians and nurses 24/7. The next step is to open the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit, which we are aiming to do towards the end of 2019, the beginning of 2020”, he said.