Health comes first: Significant investments are heading to Central Military Hospital

Health always comes first. As the founding authority of the Central Military Hospital - Faculty Hospital Ružomberok, the Ministry of Defence is seeking all available options and resources to keep it moving forward, even over and above the official budget. In this way, the MOD has secured dozens of millions of euros for the hospital, Defence Minister Jaroslav Naď announced at a press conference at the Central Military Hospital today.

Mr Naď revealed that the hospital's annual budget stands at €65m. “Apart from this, we have secured an additional €37 million which we are making available for the hospital's development in this parliamentary term,” said the Minister, noting that the MOD will continue to provide financial support for this purpose. Already today, it has €16m of additional funding in sight from the European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF). The MOD plans to use the resources for a comprehensive refurbishment of the Surgery Pavilion, which was damaged by fire earlier this October. While cooperating closely with the hospital, the MOD is working intensely to prepare the comprehensive Surgery Pavilion refurbishment project.

As well as this, the MOD will release an extra €15m from its capital expenditure programme for the hospital. This funding will go towards upgrading the hospital's IT infrastructure – the provision of the Hospital Information System (HIS), the security of the buildings, as well as purchasing new medical devices such as a Robot Operating System (ROS), a Computed Tomography (CT) scanner, lasers, an anaesthesia system, etc.

In the aftermath of the fire, the Central Military Hospital has also received sponsorship gifts from private businesses. After the Defence Minister's call for support, among the first to donate funds for repair and refurbishment works to the hospital's fire-damaged building was U.S. Lockheed Martin, the manufacturer of the F-16 fighter jets for Slovakia. The company donated US$180,000. Another three Slovak businesses have answered the call for support. Among them were ECO – INVESTMENT JSC, including its Ružomberok-based subsidiary Mondi SCP, which donated €500,000, while Aliter Technologies JSC and LYNX Ltd Košice contributed €100,000 each to the cause. “This means making an extra €850,000 available for the hospital's development over and above the budget. My sincere thanks go to all four companies, I take my hat off to them,” said Mr Naď in appreciation of the donations.

Director of the Central Military Hospital - Faculty Hospital Ružomberok Assoc Prof Róbert Rusnák MD PhD highlighted that all healthcare services in the hospital are patient-oriented, saying: “The patient is the most important person for us. For the patient's satisfaction and premium care, we need high quality personnel and environment, including technical support.” He went on to thank the MOD and the businesses for offering above-average support for the hospital. He also gave special thanks to the hospital staff for their work.

Still today, Defence Minister Jaroslav Naď and Deputy Defence Minister Marian Majer visited the docks in Liptovský Mikuláš, run by the DUKLA Military Sports Centre Banská Bystrica. “We've made savings in Defence and we’re re-investing them into renovating a building here. We are going to invest approx. €500,000 in this building,” Minister Naď confirmed. He also announced that the MOD will invest the same amount of money in the Granite Hotel Smrekovica to upgrade it, so that both people in Defence and the wider public can benefit from it.

Speaking about the investments made by the MOD in the Liptov region in this parliamentary term, including in Ružomberok, Smrekovica and Liptovský Mikuláš, Defence Minister Jaroslav Naď summed up that the MOD has invested approx. €77m in supporting different projects over and above the official budget figures and that the funds are being used to modernise the Defence facilities based there.