KARACHI: Patients suffering from gastrointestinal cancers and other serious digestive disorders will now have access to advanced diagnostic and therapeutic procedures at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), which has become Sindh’s second public sector hospital to have an endoscopic ultrasound (EUS) facility.
The sophisticated equipment was donated by Getz Pharma following a request from JPMC’s gastroenterology department to the company to improve diagnostic services for underprivileged patients from Karachi, interior Sindh and Balochistan.
According to hospital officials, EUS-guided procedures, which can cost between Rs300,000 and Rs400,000 in the private sector, would now become accessible to patients free of charge who otherwise struggle to afford specialisedinvestigations.
Endoscopic ultrasound, they said, combines conventional endoscopy with high-frequency ultrasound to produce detailed images of the digestive tract and surrounding organs, including the pancreas, liver, bile ducts and lymph nodes.
The technology helps specialists detect gastrointestinal and pancreatic cancers, assess tumour spread, investigate unexplained abnormalities and obtain tissue samples through EUS-guided fineneedle aspiration or biopsy.
It also enables selected therapeuticinterventions, including drainage of pancreatic fluid collections, certain biliary drainage procedures and other minimally invasive treatments, potentially reducing the need for major surgery.
The head of JPMC’s Gastroenterology Department, Dr Nazish Butt, said the availability of EUS represented an important advancement in the hospital’s diagnostic and therapeutic capabilities.
‘Endoscopic ultrasound allows us to examine abnormalities that conventional endoscopy and other investigations may not adequately characterise. It is particularly valuable for pancreatic lesions, gastrointestinal tumours, suspicious lymph nodes and obtaining precise tissue samples for diagnosis, she explained.Dr Butt, who is also the chair of the endoscopy committee of World Gastroenterology Organisation, said EUS-guided biopsies could help establish the nature and stage of malignancies, allowing multidisciplinary teams to determine appropriate treatment without unnecessary delays.
JPMC Executive Director Dr KhalidSher welcomed the addition, saying timely diagnosis remained critical to improving survival among patients with gastrointestinal cancers, many of whom approached tertiary-care hospitals when their disease had already advanced.
He expressed hope that the facility would reduce diagnostic delays, facili-tate earlier treatment and improve outcomes for patients unable to afford expensive private-sector services.
Getz Pharma Deputy Managing Director Zeeshan Ahmed said the company considered improving access to essential healthcare services an important part of its social responsibility.