Health is one of the areas where Gozo, when compared to Malta, faced a serious need to catch up.

Although the island has had its own health service, complete with a general hospital for a long time, this does not match the facilities on the main island.

For this reason, in many instances, Gozitans were required to commute to Malta to access the health services they require as these are not offered on their island.

EU funds have made a difference in this area as millions were invested so that the Gozo General Hospital could update its facilities.

Through an infrastructural project which lasted many months, some 886 square metres of the Gozo’s General Hospital facilities were completely refurbished, and a new operating theatre was built. At the same time, EU funds were used to upgrade a radiology unit.

Apart from the physical aspect of the works, most of the funds were spent on the procurement of state-of-the-art equipment that has provided patients in Gozo with two services not yet present on the island, including a CT scanning and mammography imaging.

The operating theatre has been highly upgraded so that it could be used for many more types of intervention. This has helped to reduce the need of referrals to Maltese services drastically, thus reducing the uncomfortable transits needed for patients as they could start having the interventions needed at their home hospital.

In all, the project included the upgrading of two units within the hospital, the introduction of seven new diagnostic services, two new surgical procedures with X-Rays and less waste generation.

Overall, it is estimated that the project contributed to a reduction of some 1000 patients from Malta’s main hospital, for CT scans, mammograms, Doppler studies, studies of obstetrics, guided biopsies, and mineral bone density tests.

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