KEF Holdings to set up Quaternary care Heart and Orthopaedics Centre in Dubai by October 2021
Dubai: KEF Holdings has announced that it will set up the first Quaternary care Heart and Orthopaedics Centre in Dubai. The Centre, it said will be opened in October 2021 and will link five countries UAE, Kuwait, Oman, Iraq and Qatar to bring efficient, world class and affordable health care to the people.
The Centre will be headquartered at the Canadian Specialty Hospital in Dubai and will cater to patients looking for cardiac and orthopedic care from all these countries.
The announcement was made virtually at Arab Health, titled ‘Future Proofing health care — the challenges and the opportunities’.
Faizal Kottikollon, the founder and chairman of KEF Holdings, said: “The health-care industry has been under increasing strain across the value-chain, as the recent pandemic has illustrated. We need to strengthen our health-care systems right from infrastructure readiness, talent availability to financial stability and build a health-care ecosystem that will be preventative in nature. At present, the patient is outside this eco-system and with Meitra Care Network, in collaboration with MGM Health Care in India and Canadian Specialty Hospital, Dubai, we aim to bring the patient at the centre of this system, making worldclass health care affordable.”
Kottikollon explained: “The way this will work is with the coining of a new term: ‘Phygital’. This refers to the physical and digital consultation. For instance, if a person in Iraq requires cardiac consultation, he will be able to contact the local care centre set up by KEF Holding in his or her country and get a detailed consultation digitally with a cardiac specialist in Dubai. The patient can reach the centre in his country and get all vital parameters checked via tele-health, digitally, which will be recorded in real time with the centre here in UAE. The doctor can then prescribe treatment to the patient if this can be handled remotely.”
He continued: “However, if the patient is assessed to require personal consultation, he or she will be flown in here, operated, physically rehabilitated at the hub, to be stationed at the Centre of Excellence at the Canadian Specialty Hospital. This kind of facility will be available in all the countries under this hub-and-spoke and home model.”
“We want to optimise the availability of specialist facilities, advance cardiac and orthopaedic care and rehabilitation, so that we reach out to the needy patients in the region,” explained Kottikollon, who already has a successful model working at Meitra Hospital, Kozhikode, Kerala, India.
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Bombay HC to form high-powered committee on Mumbai air pollution
Mumbai (PTI): The Bombay High Court on Thursday said it would form a high-powered committee to oversee the compliance of measures to tackle air pollution in the Mumbai region, noting that the efforts taken so far by state and civic authorities are insufficient.
It was not criticizing anyone but wanted to ensure that "people should live in pure air," said a division bench led by Chief Justice Shree Chandrashekhar.
The HC had in October 2023 taken suo motu cognizance of the rising pollution in the metropolis "which was ranging between good, satisfactory, moderate poor, very poor and severe", the bench noted.
Directions were issued by the court on November 6, 2023, and suggestions were made for short-term, mid-term and long-term measures.
Since then, the HC has made observations expressing dissatisfaction about the steps taken by the Mumbai and Navi Mumbai civic bodies, the judges said.
The Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB) is simply "sailing on its affidavits," but the steps purportedly taken by it were not sufficient, the court stated.
Air pollution in Mumbai has not decreased, in fact it was reported to be very severe in December, said the judges.
"We have apprised ourselves of the previous orders, and find that compliances so far made by (municipal) corporations and MPCB are not sufficient and satisfactory," the court said.
The authorities might have taken serious steps but their results were not visible, it added.
The court expressed inability to examine all the affidavits filed by the municipal corporations and MPCB and reports submitted by an expert committee (formed in 2023), citing the "rising number of dockets and limited hours and time."
After hearing all the parties at length, the high court decided to form a high-powered committee led by a former Supreme Court judge to monitor the compliance of measures to tackle air pollution in Mumbai and the surrounding areas.
The committee should meet on a daily basis, the court said, adding that its members should be provided necessary facilities.
The bench also referred to a suggestion that the citizens affected by pollution should be compensated.
The lawyer for the Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation said there are existing statutory bodies to look into this aspect.
"Maybe there are statutory bodies formed in Maharashtra, but then we have not come across any suggestion or action taken by such a body in the present proceedings..." the court said, adding that it was inclined to give "some powers" to the committee.
The court is expected to finalize the names of the committee members in its written order.
