Ministry: We need to improve

Sun2Surf: PENANG (Dec 12, 2006): The Health Ministry will have to look into ways to improve its health services system and develop its human resources capacity to avoid possible cases of negligence.
Health Ministry parliamentary secretary Datuk Lee Kah Choon said the ministry will have to seriously look into complaints and reported cases of negligence against government hospitals or medical staff.
"We will have to look into why it happens and if need be, change the way of doing things to solve the problem," he said.
Lee said the ministry is looking at how it can upgrade and improve its complaints mechanism so that complaints can be solved faster.
"We want reported cases to be immediately investigated and we want to involve both parties during the investigation," he said.
At present, a complaint goes directly to the hospital director first, after which an independent committee is formed to investigate the case.
"If the complainants are unhappy with the final outcome of their complaints, they can always send their complaints to the Malaysian Medical Council (MMC) if the complaint is against a doctor or to the Health Ministry if the complaint is against a hospital and other medical staff," Lee said.
MMC will conduct a thorough investigation into the doctor concerned and take disciplinary action if the doctor is found to be negligent in his duty, he said.
He added the ministry will do the same if the complaint is against nurses or other medical staff.
Lee was commenting on the case where a baby became semi-paralysed after delivery at the Seberang Jaya Hospital on Dec 5.
R. Santhanavaly and J. Sivananthan, both 30, claimed their son's condition could have been avoided if the staff and doctor on duty that day had delivered him via Caesarean section.