KUANTAN: The Health Ministry is planning to build a new public hospital in Kuantan to ease serious congestion at the crowded Tengku Ampuan Afzan Hospital.

Health Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai had spoken to specialists and the state Health Department director and felt that there was a need to start planning for a hospital for women and children.

“We have to begin planning the location and size of the new hospital as well as the services it can provide,” he said after a working visit to the hospital here yesterday.

Liow said there was no longer any space for the hospital for expansion.

“The land as well as the road leading to this hospital is limited, so we need another site to reduce the congestion.

“The new hospital must also be easily accessible, so the people can be served better with two operating hospitals,” he said, adding that Tengku Ampuan Afzan Hospital was also serving the southern Terengganu and northern Johor regions.

On another matter, Liow announced that the hospital had successfully performed its first cardiothoracic surgery on Nov 20 last year and nine patients had been operated on thus far.

“The cardiothoracic centre here is the seventh in Malaysia and it will complement the National Heart Institute. This is a big achievement for the Health Ministry in the east coast,” he said.

He also said a new and more advanced CT scan machine would be provided to Tengku Ampuan Afzan Hospital.

souce:the stars