Pacific Specialist Healthcare Hospital opens door in Fiji, welcomes SI patients

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By SHALENDRA PRASAD 

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Gone are the days when heart patients from Solomon Islands and other Pacific Island countries would have to endure 24-hours of air travelling and spend close to $50,000 to get heart bypass surgery in India or even other more expensive destinations in the Asia-Pacific region.

Thanks to Pacific Specialist Healthcare Hospital (PSH), a state-of-the-art 100-bed hospital which has now set-up a fully fledged cardiology department just a stone’s throw away from the Nadi International Airport in Fiji.

While it took the management of the hospital close to 15-months of meticulous planning and procuring of advanced medical equipment, the entire team at PSH is on cloud nine following their first open heart-surgery procedure that was executed successfully in Nadi by a team of experienced cardiology surgeons and specialists in November 2024.

Kusum Lata, a 61-year-old grandmother of Lautoka City in Fiji has entered her name in the history books as the first open-heart surgery patient to undergo the procedure at PSH.

She went through a delicate surgery known as “Coronary Artery Bypass Graft” (CABG) that was carried out by a team of highly trained Cardio Thoracic specialists.

The team carried out a “triple” graft procedure without any complications and the patient was subsequently discharged just in five-days after her operation as she was fit enough and in high spirits to be released.

“I can’t believe that just after five-days of having an operation, I am going home to unite with my family,” an excited Ms Lata said during her release.

“I wish to thank the management and staff of PSH for taking good care of me and highly recommend them to anyone who is going through the pain that I went through prior to my successful surgery,” she added.

“Doctors in Lautoka City told me that due to my complications, they cannot perform a triple graft bypass surgery locally and I was told to raise $50,000 (FJD) to visit India with an accompanying relative or caretaker.

“At that point, I had lost all hope but was quickly referred to PSH by a relative. I came and enquired and was told that my timing was just right because the brand-new cardiology department had just been set-up, was now fully functional and ready to roll.

“I believe it was God’s plans, and I happened to be at the right place at the right time and was so happy to learn that the total cost would be only $12,000 – a fraction of what my family would have spent in India,” Ms Lata said.

Lata’s daughter-in-law Amrita Devi could not hold back her happiness and thanked everyone involved in making the operation successful.

“On behalf of my family, I wish to thank the entire management and staff of PSH for treating my mother-in-law at such an affordable cost and am so grateful to God for showing us the path leading to this great and modern hospital in Nadi,” Ms Devi said during Lata’s release from hospital.

“I am so happy and completely lost of words – thank you once again.”

PSH founder and director Parvish Kumar says the hospital is ready to serve patients from the Solomon Islands and other neighbouring Pacific Island countries as they now have the facilities, resources and skilled specialists to do so.

“The important thing is to save a precious life, and, in that case, money becomes a secondary matter. Therefore, we have decided to extend our services to fellow Pacific Islanders at very reasonable rates,” Mr Kumar said.

“It would be a fraction of what our Pacific Islands brothers and sisters would pay in India, Australia or New Zealand for that matter.

“Our priority is to save lives in the greater Pacific Rim, and we are ready to work with regional medical insurance service providers as well.”

Mr Kumar confirmed that following the first and historic open-heart procedure, PSH is now inundated with bookings from local patients already.

Meanwhile, heart disease is a leading cause of death in the Solomon Islands. According to the latest WHO data published in 2020 Coronary Heart Disease Deaths in Solomon Islands reached 975 or 21.40% of total deaths. The age adjusted Death Rate is 285.85 per 100,000 of population ranks Solomon Islands is ranked number eight in the world.

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