Qatar Red Crescent (QRC) has sent a medical team to Mauritania to perform cardiac catheterisation for children with heart diseases.
A budget of nearly QR700,000 is allocated for the project which will serve 36 children aged between two months and 16 years, including 17 boys and 19 girls. The help is being provided for those who cannot find local treatment and whose families cannot afford treatment abroad.
Over one week, the mission will prepare, perform, and follow up on the operations, which will take place at the National Centre of Cardiology at Nouakchott, Mauritania.
QRC’s medical mission comprises Dr Mohamed Tawfik Noaman, paediatric cardiology consultant; Dr Mahmoud al-Soufi, paediatric cardiology consultant; and Abdullah Ashkenani, senior cardiovascular technician, Hamad Medical Corporation. They will be assisted by a Mauritanian anaesthetist as well as physicians,
assistants and nurses.
Ahmed al-Khulaifi, head of QRC public relations and head of the mission, said: “The QRC annual cardiac catheterisation project began in 2004 and is financed primarily from the revenue of the Ramadan fundraising campaign. It targets families that cannot afford the costs of treatment or travelling abroad. Some countries even lack domestic treatment capabilities. We are contemplating other countries, such as Djibouti, Yemen,
Niger, and others.”
“The operations are aimed at treating different heart congenital disorders and diseases among poor children, such as holes in the heart, defective heart valves. They are cardiac catheterisations, not surgical operations like open heart surgeries,” he added.
QRC has several major developmental projects in Mauritania, particularly in water and sanitation and health care. These projects include digging six water wells for 1,770 beneficiaries in six villages of Keur-Macene, at a total cost of QR 81,500.
The biggest QRC project in Mauritania is the operation and development of Hamad bin Khalifa Hospital in Boutilimit. The project aims to improve the health sector in the country by offering high-quality medical services, building capacity for health workers through training courses in and outside of Mauritania. This project is a joint partnership with Qatari-Mauritanian Social Development Foundation and Mauritanian Ministry of Health, with an overall budget of QR13,223,300
in 2013-2014.
Another project involves digging and rehabilitating six artisan wells, installing generators, pumps, tanks, pipelines, and a distribution system; digging six surface wells; repairing water canals and basins; and building sanitary toilets for the benefit of 2,500 families (15,000 people) in Boutilimit, Rkiz, and Monguel, at a total cost of QR 913,260.
