Two weeks after the inauguration of the Center for Nuclear Medicine and Radiotherapy, the Deputy Minister of Health Insurance and Management of the Unified Health System, Alejandra Hidalgo, stated that 306 cancer patients have already been treated.
“According to the reports received from the Bolivian Nuclear Energy Agency (ABEN), 306 patients have already attended consultations, referred from different second and third level hospitals in El Alto and La Paz,” he said in an interview with the program “Las 7 of the 7”.
He pointed out that very soon patients from different departments will begin to be cared for through the Unified Health System (SUS) and that it will also coordinate with the different public and private insurances for direct referral to different sections of that medical center.
“We are also working on a proposal so that the municipal and departmental governments bear part of the costs of staying for patients from the interior of the country, whose free care is guaranteed by the SUS,” he stressed.
He applauded the will of the national government to be able to give hope, better conditions and quality of care to this vulnerable sector of the population with the best professionals and the best technological equipment.
“This is a great advance for Bolivia, we are aiming to treat patients with different types of cancer in a timely manner with high-end technology, equipment that is not even available in private centers, and highly trained personnel. One of the central objectives is to be able to give a timely diagnosis, early, to avoid patients with advanced cancer”, he added.
Hidalgo announced that the national government is working on a new proposal for regional governments to pay for the stay of patients from the interior, in time to remember that free care is guaranteed by the SUS.
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