Two years after its super-speciality wing became operational, AIIMS Rajkot is now performing roughly 180 critical surgeries a month, its annual surgical volume more than doubling from 861 operations in 2024 to 1,927 in 2025, according to figures reported by Bilkul Online and corroborated by Prokerala. The institute has now treated more than 8.5 lakh patients since it opened.
Why this matters beyond the numbers
Before AIIMS Rajkot, Saurashtra residents needing advanced neurosurgery, complex urology or super-speciality intensive care typically travelled to Ahmedabad, adding hours of travel time and cost to an already stressful medical emergency. Foundation for the campus was laid in December 2020, and the super-speciality hospital, spread across nearly 200 acres, became operational in February 2024. It now runs 22 speciality and 6 super-speciality departments under one roof, including 3 Tesla MRI, CT imaging and intensive care with life-support systems. Director Dr L N Dorairajan has said the institute’s goal is to strengthen advanced care delivery while keeping treatment affordable, a claim the fee structure backs up: registration costs Rs 10, and emergency care is free for the first 24 hours of admission.
What it means for Rajkot and Saurashtra residents
The practical shift is where families in districts like Rajkot, Jamnagar, Junagadh, Porbandar and Morbi now go for a serious diagnosis. A tertiary-care institute with rising surgical throughput in the region means fewer families forced to choose between the cost of an Ahmedabad trip and delaying treatment. It also has a knock-on effect on medical education in the region: MBBS intake at AIIMS Rajkot rose from 50 to 75 seats starting the 2025-26 academic year, pushing the total undergraduate student body to 274 across five batches, which over time expands the pool of doctors trained and, often, retained in Saurashtra rather than migrating to larger cities. AIIMS Rajkot has also become a referral point for smaller government and private hospitals across the region, which increasingly transfer complex cases upward rather than send patients directly to Ahmedabad. That referral pattern is part of why patient and surgery counts have climbed as fast as they have, since the network of feeder hospitals sending cases its way has grown alongside its own reputation.
Outlook
The surgical growth curve, if it holds, points to a hospital still climbing toward its full capacity rather than one that has plateaued after its 2024 launch. The next markers worth tracking are whether staffing keeps pace with patient volume, whether wait times for specialities like oncology and cardiology come down as throughput rises, and whether the state adds more super-speciality departments to match demand from a catchment area of roughly a dozen districts.
Sources: Bilkul Online, Prokerala
This report was compiled and written with AI assistance from publicly reported sources, and reviewed for accuracy.