Rehab centres for disabled persons almost non-existent: Dr Wasey

MN Report

Karachi: Dow Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases (DICVD) and Live Donor Liver Transplantation will be made operational shortly at the Ojha campus of Dow University of Health Sciences (DUHS). 

This was announced by vice chancellor of DUHS, Prof Masood Hameed Khan while inaugurating the 2nd National Neuro-Rehabilitation Conference held at the Arag Auditorium of Dow Medical College.
The conference held on the theme of “Challenging the Challenges in Neuro-Rehab” was jointly organized by DUHS’ Institute of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation and the Pakistan Society of Neurology.

International experts from the United States, United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates and some other countries as well as Pakistani experts in neurological disorders and neuro-rehabilitation participated in the conference.

Prof Hameed said that keeping in view the increasing number of disability in Pakistan, DUHS had also established first civilian Institute of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (IPM&R) in Pakistan in 2007 to provide multidisciplinary rehabilitation services to different disabilities.

He further said that DUHS since its inception had established different departments to provide better healthcare service to the ailing humanity and also to develop human resource development for the country. The university would soon embark upon its new projects which include liver transplant project, production of anti-snake venom, production of anti-rabies, ozone and generative medicine projects, etc, he added.

He hoped that the moot would help doctors and patients in Pakistan as there was a dire need to have more rehabilitation facilities for a large number of people with disabilities.

Prominent neurologist and president of Pakistan Society of Neurology, Prof Dr Muhammad Wasey Shakir said a large number of Pakistani population was becoming disabled due to neurological, mental and physical disorders as well as due to accidents, incidents of terrorism and other reasons, besides the number of children among the permanently disabled persons was also on the rise as compared to rest of the world.

Ironically, Dr Wasey deplored, centres for rehabilitation of disabled persons, including children, were almost non-existent in Pakistan and because of that a large number of people with disabilities, who could be treated and become active members of the society, had become a burden on their families and the society for their entire lives.

He hoped that the conference would provide guidelines to health sector, academician and the authorities in realizing the importance of physical medicine and rehabilitation and more rehabilitation centres would be established in the country on the pattern of developed world.

Organizing secretary of the conference, Prof Dr Nabila Soomro said Pakistan is perhaps the only country in the world where the gap between trained physiatrists and disabled population was quite huge.

“There is only one physiatrist for around one million disabled persons. Unfortunately, majority of our disabled population comprise children, who never get a chance to be an active member of the society due to their physical or mental disabilities,” Dr Soomro regretted.

She also deplored that most of the disabled persons, particularly children, neither had facilities for rehabilitation nor the trained and qualified experts who could help them in leading a normal life.

Prof Soomro said all over the world in developed countries every hospital has Institute of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, even our neighboring countries have multiple rehabilitation institutes in all medical universities and tertiary care hospitals, catering to the multidisciplinary rehabilitation management of disabled sector of the society, but in our country this service is young, growing and neglected.

Expert of Physical Medicine from JFK Johnson Rehab Institute, New Jersey, USA, Dr Iqbal H. Jaffri and others also addressed the conference.