Pilot Projects Initiated To Improve Pre-hospital Care Services

PUTRAJAYA, Sept 8 (Bernama) -- The Health Ministry is initiating pilot projects in the Klang Valley and Penang to improve the delivery of pre-hospital care services and provide better emergency services.
Director-General of Health Tan Sri Dr Ismail Merican said Friday the projects, which were expected to take off by early next year, were meant to ensure that every person in Malaysia could be reached within 10 to 15 minutes within the "window of survival".
He said that last year the ministry focused on improving the call centres and ambulance dispatch services for the same reason.
"We will also soon introduce the Emergency Rapid Response Team-the Motorcycle Squad at the Kuala Lumpur Hospital (KLH).
"You all know how obsessed Datuk Dr Abu Hassan (Asaari Abdullah, head of the KLH Emergency Department) is with this squad and we hope the addition of this squad to our armamentarium of emergency care will help improve quality and allow for faster and greater access to such services for those in need," he said in his keynote address at the annual scientific and emergency service management conference here.
The three-day conference with the theme, "Seamless Continuum of Care: Pre-Hospital Care - The Critical Success Factor", is organised by the ministry, the Emergency Department, KLH and the Traumatology and Emergency Medicine Association Malaysia.
Dr Ismail said that next time, when a patient collapsed at home or at a shopping complex, cinema or hotel, while playing golf or waiting for the bus, care would be instituted at these locations.
He also said that under the 9th Malaysia Plan (9MP), the ministry would be putting the emergency services on its high priority list and this included provisions for crisis and disaster management, pre-hospital care, training and upgrading of the emergency departments.
"More call centres will be set up under the 9MP, with the objective of having a more co-ordinated ambulance service. We will also improve and upgrade the ambulance services in the country.
"More skilled staff will be manning the emergency departments," he said.
Dr Ismail said that for the emergency physicians, training would focus on short courses in disaster management (in Bangkok and Australia) and pre-hospital care and these would take off this month.
He also expressed disappointment that the Private Healthcare Facilities and Services Act 1998 and Regulations 2006 had triggered unsavoury protests from some medical associations recently.
"It's regarding our insistence that all healthcare facilities must have emergency care services commensurate with their practice.
"I'm disappointed, very disappointed that there are doctors among us who tell the community that they can no longer provide such care. They have forgotten their skills and that having them provide such services is deemed unfair and unjust," he said.
He said the ministry would not compromise on this and it was a wake-up call to those who have removed the word "emergency" from their medical dictionary.