Doha, March 10 (QNA) - The Hamad bin Khalifa Hospital in Boutilimit, Mauritania, has issued its annual report on the medical activities and services implemented for the benefit of local communities in Boutilimit and neighboring regions during 2023.

Over the past year, the hospital provided about 99,000 diverse medical services, including general/specialized consultations, surgeries, obstetrics, laboratory tests, radiology, and pharmaceutical prescriptions.

Operated by Qatar Red Crescent Society (QRCS), under a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Education Above All (EAA), the hospital relies on its own resources and infrastructure, with a workforce of 81 specialist physicians, nurses, assistants, social workers, and administrative staff.

To meet the hospital's everyday needs, some worn-out medical and nonmedical equipment was replaced, and there were maintenance works and repairs at some departments and facilities.

The overall budget of the hospital for 2023 amounted to USD 1,880,660. It has four medical divisions: outpatient, inpatient, technical, and emergency. There are seven outpatient clinics of internal medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, dermatology, general surgery, orthopedics, dental medicine, and ENT.

Currently, the hospital has a capacity of 54 beds in four recovery departments (internal medicine, pediatrics, Ob-Gyn, and general surgery). The reported year recorded 5,625 inpatients with a total of 12,800 stay days. The bed occupancy rate was 65.84 percent, with an average of 2.28 stay days per patient.

As the hospital pays great attention to maternal and child health, the Ob-Gyn department supervised 1,768 births, including 379 C-sections, with a 20-percent surgical intervention percentage.

The hospital continued to provide training for the students of public health schools, such as the schools of public health in Rosso and Kiffa and the National Higher School for Health Sciences in Nouakchott. To ensure sustainability of professional capacity-building, the hospital took part in many conferences and training workshops with other organizations and organized internship and field training programs for nurses.

In relation to social care, the Social Affairs Department assisted 786 poor patients to get access to vital health services. Under a partnership agreement with the National Reproductive Health Program, health care was given to 2,206 pregnant women across Boutilimit.

Established in 2007, the Hamad bin Khalifa Hospital is supervised and funded by EAA, which seeks to change the world by providing education opportunities for marginalized children and youths, believing that education is the best way out of poverty, towards just and peaceful communities that unleash the full potential of every child and youth, as education is a fundamental right for all children and one of the key pillars of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

It pursues the strategic goal of providing high-quality health care at affordable prices for the poor, to avoid the need to travel for treatment in Nouakchott or abroad. (QNA)