Sabah first bone marrow unit

KOTA KINABALU:The bone marrow transplant unit at Sabah Women and Children's hospital will start providing curative treatment to Thalassaemia patients in state this September.
  Its director Dr Tan Bee Hwai said the eighth of such facility in the country would be able to treat at least four patients in a year.
 "Patients, especially children of Thalassaemia, will have as high as 85 per cent chances to recover and thus do not have to go for monthly blood transfusion in future.
 "Upon the completion of the setting, the hospital will also have enough trained staff including paediatric oncologists to run the specialised unit," he said during a briefing on the facility yesterday.
  The unit will be housed at the hospital's new building dubbed as the Sabah Radiotherapy and Nuclear Medical Centre.
  Sabah recorded highest number of children which is 1,400 out of 5,000 registered the inherited blood disorder cases in the country.
  Most of those patients are from poor families and live in Kudat, Kota Marudu, Pitas and other rural areas in the state.
  "Previously, the hospital had to send patients to peninsular Malaysia for bone marrow transplant.
 "The hospital could only send five children annually for the bone marrow transplant as each procedure could cost up to RM35,000,"he added.
  Patients with leukemia or other diseases related to bone marrow would also be benefitted from the facility.
  Present were Sabah Consultant Paediatrician and the hospital's Paediatric department head Datuk Dr Soo Thian Lian as well as Pathology head department Dr Sharifah Atikah.
  Ends.