The Queen Elizabeth Hospital will get a new CT scanner this year thanks to the donations that came in during the 23rd annual QEH/Eastlink Telethon.
This year’s telethon raised $641,525 which is roughly $109,000 more than last year.
“I’m elated,” said Ed Lawlor, QEH Foundation board chair. “It’s a vital piece of equipment these days and this will not only replace the old one but it will upgrade its capacity so it means more CT scans and finer CT scans.”
The two-day, 18-hour telethon helped reach the $1.5 million goal to purchase a new CT scanner for the QEH diagnostic imaging department.
The rest of the funding for the scanner comes from the 2018-19 Friends for Life campaign.
Gailyne MacPherson, provincial director of diagnostic imaging for the QEH, said the new scanner replaces a current scanner that is reaching the end of its life.
“CT scanners are known as the work horse of diagnostic imaging,” she said. “We follow the Canadian Association of Radiologists guidelines on how long life expectancy is and for a CT scanner, of the use ours gets, it’s at the end of its life.”
CT scans are used in many medical areas such as detecting and following up with cancer patients. It is used on stroke patients and also for patients with a major trauma.
The new scanner will provide new technologies like a higher degree of image resolution and more.
“This one will have a (fluoroscopy) unit with it so for CT guided biopsies it will provide real-time imaging for insertion of the needle for the biopsy,” said MacPherson.
MacPherson said the hospital will finalize which scanner it wants within the next week and order it. It will take about 12 weeks for the new scanner to be built and sent to the hospital.
It will also take about a week to remove the old equipment and about two more weeks to prepare the room and install the new scanner.
“We’re hoping it will be installed sometime this fall,” said MacPherson.
Additional funds raised on the weekend also supported priority medical equipment for cancer treatment, nursing units and more areas throughout the hospital.
“Besides the CT scanner there’s a long list of equipment needed so this just allows us to go down that list further, maybe it’s a scope, maybe it’s a pump,” said Lawlor.
The QEH Auxiliary donated $160,000 during the telethon, which will fund additional patient ceiling lifts in the nursing units.
Donations can still be made by calling the QEH foundation at (902)894-2425 or online at qehfoundation.pe.ca.
