Students take selfie against the Worlds first Lifeline Hospital train (File/ Express photo by Ganesh Shirsekar) Students take selfie against the Worlds first Lifeline Hospital train (File/ Express photo by Ganesh Shirsekar)

Over a thousand patients from far-flung rural hamlets of North Tripura district have been treated at Lifeline Express, the world’s first hospital train, since Tuesday at Churaibari Railway Station of North Tripura district.

Lifeline Express is a train healthcare service which was set up as a joint initiative of Impact India Foundation, Indian Railways and Ministry of Health in 1991.

Speaking to indianexpress.com, Lifeline Express Joint Director Anil Premsagar Wednesday informed that the hospital train received good response among local people and has attended to over a thousand patients in the first two days.

“We received 400 patients on the first day. It is 4 PM now and we have already received 600 patients. The idea behind the train is to provide diagnostic, medical and advanced surgical treatment to persons with disabilities and reach out to inaccessible rural areas that lack medical services”, he said.

Among those who received treatment on the ‘hospital train’ so far, 77 cataract patients were identified, who would undergo surgery starting tomorrow.

“We have identified 77 cataract patients here so far. We shall commence surgery from tomorrow. We offer surgeries on eye and ear conditions, plastic surgery, orthopedic surgery and treatment of oral, breast and cervical cancer on Lifeline Express”, Premsagar told this correspondent.

CMO Jagadish Chandra Nama said 11 health department personnel were deployed at Churaibari to assist authorities on board the train. This is a great service and we shall support it in every way, he said.

Churaibari Assistant Station Superintendent Prasanta Bhattacharjee informed that the train arrived in Tripura on December 16. It has started offering treatment since Tuesday and would continue its services till January 06 next year.

Lifeline Express was initially supposed to make base at Kumarghat railway station in Tripura. But it was routed to Churaibari due to absence of siding line and problems of Food Corporation of India (FCI) work at Kumarhat.

Its services were opened up at Churaibari on Tuesday by North Tripura district magistrate Raval Hamendra Kumar.

The hospital train has conducted 1.30 lakh surgeries and treated over 10 lakh patients in its Out Patient Department (OPD) across 184 districts in 20 states of the country till now.

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