Senator JV Ejercito (right) walks with Quezon Gov. David ‘Jayjay’ Suarez at the ground floor of Quezon Medical Center in Lucena city. (JO...
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| Senator JV Ejercito (right) walks with Quezon Gov. David ‘Jayjay’ Suarez at the ground floor of Quezon Medical Center in Lucena city. (JOHN BELLO) |
LUCENA CITY - As 500 medical patients in any given day swamped the 200 bed capacity at Quezon Medical Center (QMC) here, the provincial governor of Quezon asked visiting Sen. Joseph Victor ‘JV’ Ejercito to pitch in and help solve the growing problems of congestion, inadequate health facilities and lack of needed equipment of QMC and 15 other district hospitals in the province.
“The problem is congestion and inadequate facilities in QMC and in 15 other district hospitals in our province but we are trying our best to address the pressing need for sufficient health facilities of our growing population and the visit of Sen. JV Ejercito is a blessing and a big boost for the health sector of our province,” Gov. David ‘Jayjay’ Suarez said yesterday after he, QMC director Rolando Padre, provincial administrator Rommel Edaño, chief of staff Webster Letargo and other provincial government personnel have accompanied Sen. Ejercito through a quick tour of several facilities and wards of the premier hospital of the province.
Suarez said the provincial government is allocating P150 million for QMC and the MRI facility promised to be granted by the Dept. of Health which would go a long way to help meet the need for facilities and medical need of patients in the province.
Ejercito, chairman of the Senate committee on health, has seen that several patients were lying in bed in the hallways and ailse of QMC and learned that Quezon has a health care ratio of 1 bed for 1,312 population and the provincial government is trying to narrow the gap into the ideal ratio of 1 bed for every 800 population.
Ejercito assured Suarez that he will confer and coordinate with his counterpart, Quezon 4th District Rep. Helen Tan, House chair of the Committee on Health, how they can help address the problems of health infrastructure and health equipment in Quezon in the next budget deliberation for the necessary funding.
He said that 42,000 hospital beds are needed in various hospitals nationwide and the government needs some P282 billion to build the necessary hospital facilities.
“I hope to fast track and address the overcapacity of various hospitals in Quezon and I hope that in 2022 I will no longer see patients along the ailse and corridors of hospitals,” the senator said adding that his priorities are universal health care program, the improvement of the railway system and the creation of the Dept. of Housing.
Suarez said that one way to decongest QMC is for the city government of Lucena to put up its own hospital as almost 20 to 30% of patients admission in the hospital come from Lucena.
Dra. Grace Santiago, officer in charge of the Quezon One Thousand Days of Life program that is now being implemented in the whole province for the health, care and nutrition of mother and child, presented the province’ Government Hospitals Development Plan for 2019 to 2022.
It was shown that the province needs funds amounting to P1,409,667,000 – P954,940,000 for health infrastructure and P454,727,000 for medical equipment to address the problem of overcapacity at QMC and the other 15 hospitals scattered in the province’ 39 towns and 2 cities.
The presentation showed that the leading causes of admission in QMC and in 15 other hospitals in the province is child deliveries and the leading causes of consultation is pneumonia. The basic services in all Quezon hospitals are : laboratory for blood typing, urinalysis, CBC; diagnostic, pharmacy, outpatient consultation, 24/7 emergency response, minor surgical procedures and normal deliveries.
It also showed that only QMC has CT Scan, Mammogram, special screening procedures, blood bank and transfusion while other district hospitals in the province provide services for blood chemistry, ultrasound and major surgical procedures.
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