The Centro Hospitalar Universitário do Algarve (CHUA) will have a Nuclear Medicine service installed in the Portimão unit and operating «within 120 days», that is, in mid-September.
In an investment of 1,5 million euros, the new service, which was presented yesterday at the hospital in Portimão, will be the only one of its kind in the whole of the south of the country, not only in terms of the National Health Service, but also in private hospitals.
The equipment to be installed is «high-tech, launched less than a year ago worldwide», announced Jorge Oliveira, director general of Siemens, the company that won the international public tender to install the new service (facilities and equipment).
It is, in fact, the «third equipment of these at national level», and «there was none south of the Tagus», added that official.
Elísio Sousa, director of the new Nuclear Medicine Service, explained that this equipment is «extremely important for the real population of the Algarve, which greatly exceeds the half million statistics», as well as for neighboring Alentejo.
The new equipment, which will allow «saving more lives», «has diagnostic (through the images it generates), laboratory and therapeutic aspects», allowing «to be early in the diagnosis of pathologies» and «more assertive in therapy, namely through of radiopharmaceuticals".
It is intended to «promote diagnosis and treatment, namely in the areas of cardiology, pneumology, rheumatology, endocrinology, nephro-urology, neurology, oncology, in pre- and peri-operative exams».
“Will it improve the quality of life of patients? Go! Will it increase the amount of life of patients? Go! We are going to have an earlier diagnosis, we are going to have more effective therapies, patients who will not need to travel», summarized the specialist doctor, who, with his team, is a new acquisition of the CHUA.
José Apolinário, president of the Commission for Coordination and Regional Development (CCDR) of the Algarve, the entity that manages community funds, stressed, for his part, that «the Algarve is a region historically with little investment in the area of Health». The last major investment, he recalled, was precisely the hospital in Portimão, where the ceremony was taking place, inaugurated more than twenty years ago, in July 1999.
Revealing that there are 7 million euros in funding from community funds through the ERDF just for projects by CHUA and the Regional Health Administration (ARS) in the Algarve, the president of CCDR stressed: «what is at stake here is investing in the quality of health system, investing in research and development, because this will certainly bring returns in the future. This is the best way to ensure greater competitiveness in the long term» for the Algarve.
Ana Varges Gomes, president of the Board of Directors of CHUA, speaking to the Sul Informação at the end of the ceremony, he stressed that the creation of this new Nuclear Medicine Service «is not a simple process», as it involves a «complete project that includes installations and equipment. It's not just building walls, or just installing new equipment».
The choice of the hospital in Portimão for the Service has to do with space, as the hospital in Faro it's bursting at the seams. «Here we have more space and capacity to install this service», explained Ana Varges Gomes.
The person in charge also made a point of underlining the presence of the team that will ensure the new service. In addition to specialist physician Elísio Sousa, who is the Director of the Service, there are also specialized technicians, a total of five people, who «came again, were hired to be here».
«This is another step towards having a university hospital center with more and more possibilities to attract other professionals to work with us, to have the quality they need in the equipment and help us to carry out their diagnoses, thus attracting more people who can settle in the our region", said Ana Varges Gomes.
«The equipment helps to attract people, if it were obsolete equipment it would be difficult, but this is top of the range, one of the first in this category at national level», he added.
But CHUA will not stop there. questioned by Sul Informação about the future investments foreseen, the official announced the acquisition of an Angio TAC «in the short term», in an investment of «around 1 million euros», already applied for EU funds.
The CAT Angio, he explained, «will make it possible to carry out studies from the cardiac point of view, without the need for catheterization, for example when there is a suspicion of a heart attack. It is a less invasive exam, which allows for better image quality, other types of exams».
According to Ana Varges Gomes, «it will be the first Angio CAT at the level of the National Health Service».
Once again, he reinforced, this equipment will also be important to "increase our research capacity" and thus try to attract more health professionals to the Algarve.
Horácio Guerreiro, CHUA's clinical director, had already mentioned the same thing: «this equipment is essential for raising funds», as doctors, nurses and other health professionals prefer to be where the best services and equipment are.
The CAT scan equipment could, in fact, be important for Cardiac Surgery which, according to Horácio Guerreiro, will «begin this year» at CHUA, with «a team prepared to come here».
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