20 health centres planned

A private medical company plans to relieve the "huge strain" on the health care sector by building 20 new centres in Abu Dhabi.

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ABU DHABI // A private medical company plans to relieve the "huge strain" on the health care sector by building 20 new centres in Abu Dhabi. United Eastern Medical Services (UEMedical) will open three of the centres by the beginning of next year, but would not say when the others would be launched. "The market is far greater than can be supplied by a small number of centres," said Majd Abu Zant, business development manager of the group. "Health insurance last year has created a huge strain on existing health care providers. The average wait for an appointment is two to six weeks, depending on the speciality."

The three new centres will specialise in areas not already provided for - women's health, fertility and genetics, and day surgery. "You have long waiting times, specialist services that aren't available," Mr Abu Zant said. "When you add the compounded population growth and you look at diseases specific to the population - such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease, thalassaemia - then you see that the demand projections are phenomenal."

Half the new clinics will provide specialist services and half will be family medicine clinics. There are also plans to build a specialist orthopaedics and rehabilitation centre and dental centre. Details were not disclosed. amcmeans@thenational.ae