The President of the Canary Islands Government, Fernando Clavijo (CC), along with the Minister of Health, Esther Monzón, and the President of the Cabildo, the also nationalist Rosa Dávila, among other officials, will visit tomorrow at 9 am the newly inaugurated Palliative Care Health Unit at the Hospital del Sur. This unit has been in operation for less than a month and comprises the first four beds out of the ten that are planned, aimed at alleviating the suffering of patients in the terminal phase.
The unit’s operations have been expedited following the efforts of a community group led by Vanesa Díaz, a resident of Cabo Blanco, and will help to prevent unnecessary transfers of critically ill cancer patients to the La Candelaria Hospital.
The introduction of the Palliative Care Unit is the latest addition to the El Mojón health centre, following the launch of the oncology day hospital on 27 June last year. This facility spans 600 square metres and is divided into three treatment rooms, which will help to ease the patient care load at the main hospital in the metropolitan area, currently administering around 5,000 intravenous treatments to patients in the south.
During tomorrow’s visit, representatives of the Pro Hospital Público del Sur platform are hoping that the authorities will provide them with further details regarding outstanding benefits. Above all, they are keen for clarity on the budget allocation set for the tender for the drafting of the project and the management of the work to expand the facilities into an adjacent building currently under construction.
Jordi Esplugas, a spokesperson for this community group, had previously expressed his concerns in this publication about the project’s delay and deemed it “very important” for the processes to be hastened so that construction can commence this year.
The building, which has been transferred by the Cabildo to the Canarian Health Service in exchange for handing over the former CAE facilities to the Tenerife institution for a senior citizens’ centre, will accommodate the establishment of intensive care units (ICU), a dialysis service, a day hospital, and will expand the surgical area from the current four operating rooms to 18.
The investment is projected to exceed 40 million euros and will involve an expansion of the hospital by approximately 20,000 square metres.
