AIIMS strives hard to make world class clinical care available to millions of underprivileged citizens of India and neighboring countries. While its magnificent buildings and hi-tech facilities may create a superficial image of elitism, a visit to AIIMS is enough to dispel any such illusion
 

Its corridors are thronged by patients, most of them too poor to afford quality treatment elsewhere. They come here with high hopes because of the reputation which AIIMS has built up. AIIMS is at present, not a single hospital but a conglomerate of facilities .It has over 1500 spread over the main hospital, Dr. Rajendra Prasad Centre for Ophthalmic sciences, Cardiothoracic Centre, Neurosciences Centre, Institute Rotary Centre Hospital and De-addiction Centre. This complex of facilities caters to about 1.5 million outpatients and 80,000 inpatients every year .The number of surgical operations performed at AIIMS last year was over 100,000.

Coronary bypass surgery in progress at Cardiothoracic Centre, AIIMS

Shri Devi Ram, the first heart transplant patient in India, operated on 3 August 1994 at AIIMS.

The hi-tech facilities and nursing care at AIIMS have contributed a lot to the survival of these quadruplets

The role of AIIMS in patient care is not confined to our own hospital.AIIMS has trained   physicians and surgeons who have fanned out across the country and abroad.For  decades a large proportion of neurologists, neurosurgeons, cardiac surgeons,   paediatric surgeons and gastroenterologists were from AIIMS,simply because we were   the first to start courses in these superspecialities.New we have D M courses also in   endocrinology and medical oncology.The nation has invested heavily in AIIMS from its   doubt that AIIMS meager resources in an attempt to provide the best possible health   care to its people irrespective of their paying capacity. Few would has fulfilled its   commitment.