The waiting time for radiotherapy services at Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) more than doubled in the financial year ended June 2025, dealing a blow to cancer patients amid repeated breakdowns of key medical machines.
Radiotherapy is a cancer treatment that uses high doses of radiation to kill cancer cells and shrink tumors.
Latest data shows radiotherapy wait times at Kenya’s top referral hospital jumped to an average of 37 days from 18 days in the previous financial year.
This was more than twice the target of 17 days, with the hospital attributing this to machine breakdown and increased demand for the service.
“In the financial year 2022/23 and 2024/25, targets were not met. This was due to frequent equipment breakdown and increased demand for radiotherapy services at the hospital,” says the State Department for Medical Services in health sector reports to the Treasury.
KNH has faced recurring issues with its radiotherapy machines, particularly the Linear Accelerator (Linac) machine, which is a critical part of the hospital's cancer treatment.
The rise in wait times for radiotherapy services contrasted with chemotherapy, which saw an improvement to 2.57 days compared to three in the previous year, and the targeted 12 days.
This was on the back of introducing round-the-clock services.
“Targets met and overachieved. The hospital introduced 24-hour outpatient chemotherapy services as well as the implementation of the patient navigation programme,” said the department on chemotherapy wait times at KNH.
Overall, KNH saw the number of oncology sessions on chemotherapy and radiotherapy drop to 22,873 in the year ended June this year from 43,216 in the previous year.
This points to the impact of the Linac machine setback.
Machine breakdowns also affected highly specialised services at the hospital.
KNH’s cardiothoracic unit reported missed surgery targets in 2024/25, specifically due to the breakdown of the image intensifier and Cath lab equipment—both essential for heart surgeries. The number of heart surgeries fell to 1,045 from 1,293.
Radiotherapy delays were not unique to KNH. Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital reported wait times of 70 days from 69 in the previous financial year and 46 in 2022/2023.
However, MTRH posted a rise in the number of external beam radiotherapy sessions to 21,482 from 17,014, surpassing the targeted 10,150.
“This was attributed to continued scheduling of patients and timely treatment planning, and by operationalisation of the second Linac radiotherapy machines, employment of two more medical physicists, and timely procurement of radiotherapy source,” said the State department.
Over the same period, MTRH saw the number of oncology sessions on chemotherapy and radiotherapy rise to 1,492 from 1,092 due to the availability of oncology medication and equipment.
At Kenyatta University Teaching, Referral & Research Hospital (KUTRRH), the average wait time for radiotherapy improved to 18 days in the year to June 2025 from 60 days in the previous year, but came short of the targeted 12 days.
This was due to the high number of patients.
“The targets were not achieved due to the inability to meet the demand for radiotherapy services. The hospital capacity for radiotherapy (one Linac machine) is stretched to the maximum,” said the State Department.
The average wait time for chemotherapy services at the same hospital more than doubled to 14 days from six days due to increased demand.
This eroded the gains in the previous financial year, where the introduction of a new shift for chemotherapy services had cut the average wait time from seven days.
In financial year 2024/25, the number of patients receiving chemotherapy and radiotherapy treatment at KUTRRH dropped to 19,561 from 21,640 due to challenges with supplies of chemotherapy drugs.
