The state health department will soon launch an integrated cancer treatment facility at the North Bengal Medical College and Hospital (NBMCH) and is working on the plan to set up a state-of-the-art cancer hospital here in association with the Tata Memorial Hospital, Mumbai.

The NBMCH at Sushrutanagar on the outskirts of Siliguri is the main state-run referral hospital in north Bengal.

“The oncology department of the NBMCH will get services like medicine, surgery, paediatrics, orthopaedics and ENT under one roof. Rooms have been identified for such departments at the oncology department. We will have 30 beds for surgical oncology (including orthopaedics), 15 beds for medical oncology, 15 beds for paediatrics and 15 beds for ENT,” said Sushanta Roy, the officer on special duty of the state health department in north Bengal.

The facility will be ready by mid-January and start from February, he added.

“To run this integrated facility, we are sending physicians, paediatricians and some other specialist doctors, around 10 nurses and some assistant superintendents to Mumbai for training. Their training will start from December 12,” Roy added.

As of now, there is a cancer treatment facility at the NBMCH but patients have to visit different departments, depending on the case.

The hospital, sources said, will also receive 13 new senior resident doctors and two faculty members. “Among these doctors, five each would be posted under medical oncology and surgical medicine while the rest three will work under radiation oncology,” said a source.

At the MJN Medical College and Hospital in Cooch Behar, some new outpatient departments were opened on Tuesday.

Sources said specialist doctors like cardiologists, nephrologists, neurosurgeons and radio oncologists will attend the OPDs. Surgical urology and rheumatology services were introduced at the hospital from Tuesday too.

Civic projects

The board of administrators (BoA) of Siliguri Municipal Corporation, carrying out 270 infrastructure projects in the civic area across 47 wards, has finished almost half of them, said Gautam Deb, chairperson of the BoA here on Tuesday

“We have taken up around 270 projects with an estimated cost of Rs 37.56 crore. Of these, 125 projects have been completed while work of the remaining projects is on,” said Deb. These include construction and repairing of roads, sewerage, culverts and health centres.