ties rooms are provided for waiting, viewing and encoffining.
The route of the hearses is for the most part entirely out of the view of the public areas and wards.
RADIOLOGICAL DEPARTMENT
The Royal Hong Kong Jockey Club donated $6 million towards the cost of building and equipping the Radiological Department.
This department, to be called the Queen Elizabeth Hospital Radiolo. gical Institute, is housed in the four- storey Southeast wing of the main building, and consists of three sec- tions.
The radiodiagnostic section, con- tained largely on the top floor of the Southeast wing, corresponding to the first floor of the hospital, will be equipped with modern diagnos- tic X-ray machines and automatic film-processing units.
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One of the rooms in this depart- ment will be used for highly speci alised X-ray investigations such angio-cardiography, by which the chambers of the heart and lumens of blood vessels can be visualised. and cerebral angio-graphy, the pro- cess of visualising the blood vessels of the brain.
The main equipment in the speci. al examination room of the radio- diagnostic section is a Roentgen 600 with an output of 150,000 volts. Closely associated with this is a Cinelux image intensifier which in- corporates a closed television circuit and a cine camera as well as a rapid film changer.
This Roentgen machine can in- tensify the X-ray image on the fluorescent screen 1,000 to 1,200 times as compared to a regular unit. and it uses only a small amount of X-rays to activate it. Radiation to both patient and radiologist is thus enormously reduced.
The television monitor enables the whole team to watch the progress of the examination being undertaken. whilst the cine camera is always in readiness to record the important parts of the examination for fur- ther study.
The biplane rapid filin changer enables X-ray films to be taken
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Bimultaneously at right angles to each other at a rate of up to six films a second.
Other machinery in this section includes a pluristrator, which is in- valuable for the detection of chest diseases, a skull table for precision skull radiography, a mobile intensi- fier which will be used in the operat- ing theatres for many intricate sur- gical procedures, a power-driven mobile X-ray machine for bedside radiography in the wards, an automa- tic film processing unit which pro- duces finished radiographs in seven minutes and is capable of handling 250 films an hour, special apparatus for arteriograms and venograms of the legs, and a variety of modern con- ventional equipment and accessories to cover every aspect of radiography and casualty work.
Also included in the Institute is the mould. planning and isodose section for dealing especially with cancer or tumours. Both physicists and radio-therapists work as a team in this section.
Two special physics laboratories have been built for use both as places for teaching and for experi- ments in the properties of radiation. Design and development of specific electronic equipment for radiation measurement and other requirements will be built and tested in these laboratories.
There is also a laboratory set apart for the handling of radio-active isotopes for use in the diagnosis and treatment of certain diseases.
Special nuclear equipment. similar to that already in use at Queen Mary Hospital, designed for the medical
use
of radio-active isotopes. has already been received and will be installed in these laboratories.
A workshop is also incorporated into this section. It is designed to handle maintenance and repair of all Government radiological and physics equipment in Kowloon and the New Territories.
The workshop consists of two rooms, one to handle heavy duty requirements on machinery and the other for work of a more delicate
nature.
The radio-therapeutic section will have five radiological machines for external radio-therapy.
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Included in the machinery to be installed are three super voltage X- ray machines a 5-35m electron volt Swiss-made betatron for pro- duction of either X-rays or electron beams for use against cancer, and two British-made 6m electron volt linear accelerators for the production of X-rays only.
A 250 kilovolt deep X-ray machine will be used largely for experimental and research purposes, and superficial X-ray machine is for the treatment of skin and eye diseases.
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Additionally, there are a number of radio-isotope, physics, radio-bio- chemical and animal laboratories.
A large stock of radium is stored in a specially constructed lead safe built into a five-foot concrete wall.
The radio-therapeutic section of the Institute is intended primarily for patients in Kowloon and the New Territories, leaving the Queen Mary Hospital to deal with patients on Hong Kong island.
It is estimated that by 1966, when the population of Hong Kong will have reached four million, there will be about 5,000 new cancer cases requiring radio-therapy each year.
The radio-therapeutic facilities in the Institute will be able to cope with about 1,500 to 1,800 of these cases annually.
In Hong Kong in 1962 there were 2.488 deaths caused by cancer. com- pared with only 1,881 caused by tuberculosis.
Not all patients treated by radio. therapy are suffering from cancer. At least a quarter of them are suffer- ing from a variety of diseases which are treated with the same equipment.
PHARMACY, BLOOD BANK
These together take up approxiın- ately the same as the C.S.S.D. on the floor above.
The pharmacy has the usual faci- lities for the preparation and/or storage of medicines, drugs and sterile solutions and also retains stocks of special medical equipment, instruments and spirit.
Cold rooms with standby arrange- ments are provided separately both for the pharmacy and blood bank laboratory.
THE HONG KONG & FAR EAST BUILDER
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- VOLUME 18, NUMBER 5
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