Dr AZM Zahid Hossain, vice chairman of the BNP and personal physician to Khaleda Zia, the party chairperson, has voiced his request for her to receive advanced treatment abroad for her liver disease.
Speaking to journalists outside the BNP chief's Gulshan residence late on Saturday, Dr Zahid emphasized the urgent need for Khaleda Zia, who is suffering from chronic liver disease, to be taken outside the country for enhanced medical care.
He said the medical board attending to her had repeatedly urged the authorities, including through written communication, to facilitate her transfer to a foreign country for specialized treatment.
In particular, Khaleda Zia should be admitted to a medical centre equipped with transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS) facilities, he added.
Khaleda Zia returned to her home in Gulshan at around 7:50pm on Saturday after receiving medical attention at Evercare Hospital in Bashundhara for a period of five days.
Dr Zahid confirmed that her treatment would now continue from her home and that additional tests conducted on Saturday morning had shown some improvement in her condition.
He said Khaleda Zia's health had relatively improved, allowing her to be under the care of her medical board while receiving treatment at home.
Khaleda Zia, a former prime minister, has been suffering from various ailments, including liver cirrhosis, arthritis, diabetes, and kidney, lung, heart and eye problems.
Since her conditional release from jail in 2020, the BNP chief has been receiving treatment at the hospital under a medical board headed by cardiologist Prof Shahabuddin Talukder.
On June 10 last year, she suffered a heart attack due to a 95% block in her left artery. A stent was placed there by removing the blockage at the same hospital the following day.
Doctors also found two more blocks in her blood vessels, but they could not remove those due to her health complications.
Khaleda was sent to the Old Dhaka Central Jail after a lower court sentenced her to five years in prison in the Zia Orphanage Trust corruption case on February 8, 2018.
Later, she was found guilty in another corruption case the same year.
During the Covid pandemic, the government temporarily freed Khaleda Zia from jail through an executive order suspending her sentence on March 25, 2020, on the condition that she would stay in her Gulshan house and not leave the country.
