Although several irregularities were allowed to persist at the Diamond Diagnostic Centre in the recent past, these are about to be reversed with immediate effect.Director of Regional Health Services, Dr Narine Singh, has been instructed to visit the facility on a frequent basis, perhaps once a week for at least the next several months. This disclosure was made by Minister within the Health Ministry,Cheap Jerseys From China, Dr Bheri Ramsaran,Cheap Jerseys Authentic, following a thorough visit of the facility over the Easter Holiday weekend.Minister within the Health Ministry,NFL Cheap Jerseys China, Dr Bheri RamsaranThe Minister’s visit was prompted by the disturbing situation which constituted failure on the part of officials at the health facility to dispatch an ambulance to transport accident victim,Cheap Jerseys From China, Romona Harris, to access medical attention.Harris was struck down from behind by a motor car on Good Friday night. She succumbed before receiving medical attention.An unsettling scenario of the unfortunate incident was reported by this newspaper and spurred the attention of the Minister who carried out a three-hour long visit at the Diamond facility the following day. He has since deduced that there is an urgent need for more visitations at the facility.“These visits will not be fleeting. They will be of a supervisory, monitoring and evaluation nature,” Minister Ramsaran asserted.According to the Minister, although the hospital staff and management have been trying, they need some added assistance thus the need to have the hospital operation be reverted to one which is monitored closely by his office. According to the Minister the recent incident was nothing less than “an embarrassment.”In addition to instructing that visits become imperative, the Minister revealed that he has also instructed that the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry hire several recently graduated nurses who are not yet employed or have just graduated.According to the Minister it is expected that the nurses will be employed on a short-shift basis. This measure, he said,Jerseys NFL Wholesale, will help to boost the services offered at the facility and at the same time satisfy a request made by the leader of the Cuban medical team stationed at the Diamond facility. He has requested specific support for triage nurses.“Priority will be given to attaching them, on his advice,Cheap Jerseys From China Online, to the triage area but other nurses will be recruited for other areas,” Minister Ramsaran disclosed.During his visit at the weekend, the Minister said that he discovered that the facility’s pharmacy services were not being offered on holidays and weekends, a state of affairs which came as a surprise to him.He recounted that following its commissioning, about two years ago, the Diagnostic Centre had a mere two Cuban Pharmacy personnel who did a notably good job of working even after hours, utilising a shift system that catered for weekends and holidays as well.However, even with the addition of at least two Guyanese personnel to the operation that system has since ceased. “Now we have added Guyanese I am surprised to note that they are apparently not being tasked to work after regular working hours (16:30 hours) and on weekends and holidays.“I have advised that we have to reinstate the system that the Cubans had implemented but the Cubans cannot take the workload alone. The added Guyanese staffers have to take some responsibility and take some of the pressure off from the Cuban team.”For this reason the Minister revealed that Dr Singh has also been advised to offer his supervision in this area to ensure that there are no deficiencies in a rota or scheduling system for the pharmacy personnel.With the implementation of the various corrective measures, the Minister is not only confident that there will be an improved service offered but patients will also be able to access medication even on holidays and weekends rather than be given prescriptions.“I discovered that doctors were being forced to give prescriptions for drugs we adequately had in good condition in the hospital’s pharmacy.”But there were yet more issues of concern that the Minister observed during his weekend visit. According to him he was shocked to discover that when he arrived at the facility an ambulance was at the time about to transport an asthma patient to the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation.And this should never be the case, the Minister said, since the hospital was furnished with a powerful well organised asthma bay. “This is a modern facility it was so designed that the oxygen comes out from a centralised system out of valves on the walls…not in the old primitive way where we had it coming out of cylinders.“I was shocked to know that my ambulance and attendant were being sent to the GPHC because a patient suffered from asthma was being referred from Diamond.”Investigations revealed that an accessory (a little dispenser from which the medication needed to help the patient is vaporised to enter the patient’s lung) had long been broken. According to the Minister this accessory is valued at a mere two or three American cents.He said that he immediately contacted the GPHC and got help from staffers there who helped him to secure not only the accessory but three complete sets for administering the medication; that is the line leading from the oxygen port in the wall from the accessory to the patient’s face mask thereby allowing the vaporised medication to enter the patient lungs and bring almost immediate relief.The secured items were tested on arrival, the Minister said,Wholesale Jerseys China, and were found to be functional.And for the discovered bugbears, the Minister offered profound apologises to the clientele on the East Bank of Demerara who utilise the facility. “We have taken those small easy to accomplish measures that should have been taken before to bring some added comfort so now our patients will not be sent to harass an already overworked GPHC staff because they are doing a good job there.”Since the establishment of the Diamond Diagnostic Centre it has been the boast of the Central Administration that Diamond was taking off the pressure from the GPHC, a reality the Minister expects will be very visible. |