A dedicated liver clinic today for accurate clinical diagnosis and systematic therapy through lifestyle changes, diet correction or medication. A 185-bed super-speciality hospital tomorrow to house cutting-edge cancer care, neuro-sciences and orthopaedics wings to augment the existing 165-bed infrastructure.

In keeping with the recent trend among private healthcare players, AMRI Hospitals in Dhakuria is in expansion mode.

While the focused liver clinic — part of the hospital’s revamped gastroenterology department — has started functioning from this month itself, the new Rs 50-crore onco-neuro-ortho facility will be up and running by April next year.

“This will be the first private sector unit in the city to offer comprehensive radiotherapy using a linear accelerator, besides having facilities like brachytherapy and computerised treatment planning,” says director S.K. Todi.

The seven-storey, 95,000-sq-ft hospital, coming up behind the existing structure, will incorporate an integrated trauma care centre with specialised rehab, sports medicine and cosmetic surgery. Five full-fledged operating theatres and three minor theatres will offer a range of surgical procedures in all the three specialities, while neurology will have digital subtraction angiography.

If the adjacent hospital is still a year away, the liver clinic, anchored by consultant hepatologist and gastroenterologist Sarika Kedia, answers a growing need. “Liver diseases are assuming endemic proportions and at the dedicated clinic in AMRI, we are focusing as much on patient education as on clinical findings and therapy,” observes Kedia, a certified liver transplantation physician with specialist training from Mount Sinai Hospital, New York.

Besides providing critical inputs to patients on preventing and managing common liver ailments, the clinic also plans to conduct an orientation programme for general physicians in south Calcutta. “There are a lot of common myths and wrong notions which can be dispelled through the formation of a patient support group,” Kedia says.