Works to construct the new Internal Diseases Hospital at the Mother Teresa University Hospital Centre in Tirana, one of the biggest investments in the country’s health care system, have not been suspended despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the devastating earthquake that hit the country last November. Construction works have entered an advanced stage to build the new hospital facility. Prime Minister Edi Rama, accompanied by the Minister of Health and Social Protection Ogerta Manastirliu, inspected the ongoing work today.

The new Internal Diseases Hospital is another link in the chain of transforming investments, which are gradually turning the largest University Hospital Centre into a space of high quality health care services in our region.

Health Minister noted that the new hospital facility will reorganize, modernize and transform internal medicine care.

“The facility has a total construction area of approximately 26.700 square meters. The current emergency ward will be transferred to the new facility. The new hospital will house the wards of hemodynamic and the emergency health care services that should be accommodated in one single building to ensure best delivery. These services are currently scattered in various buildings. The hospital will have a capacity of 370 beds and, for the first time, it will also include a day hospital, or an outpatient facility with a capacity of 60 beds, which will be housed in the facility in front of us and which are organically linked with two structures, already finalized,” the Minister of Health said.

PM Rama described the project as a major investment designed to completely change the situation of the health care service, adding that the increased state budget for the country’s health system has allowed for important investments not only in the University Hospital Centre, but also in all regional hospitals and health care centres all over the country.

Health Minister voiced optimism about completion of the new hospital facility, which will be equipped with state-of-the-art technology. “Major investments are underway. Work for construction of the new paediatric hospital is also underway, another gigantic investment to build a new facility from scratch to establish a small university paediatric corpus,” Health Minister said, adding that two more important investments will support construction of a new infectious diseases hospital and the Heart Surgery Centre with the support of the World Bank.

One of the doctors working at the University Hospital Centre for years said that such investments are will take the provision of healthcare services to a whole new level.