Some of the health professionals that attended yesterday’s conference.
Dr. Carlos Chase, Head of O&G, also stressed the need for more nurses.
NURSING SHORTAGE
There is a shortage of nursing staff in the healthcare sector and a senior medical official assures that plans are being put in place to address it.
Word of this came from Dr. Karen Broome, Senior Medical Officer at the Ministry of Education, as she discussed some of the plans they had for the community in 2018 during the 11th Perinatal Data Review Conference, which was held at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital yesterday morning.
“Right now because of the shortage of nurses, we’re doing a ‘Prioritise System’ where if the QEH has a mother or baby that they are concerned about, they just call the polyclinic and the polyclinic ensures that they get a visit within 48 hours. It has been working well so far and we are really trying to stick with it,” she said.
“We do have a Human Resource for Nursing Development plan that was done through PAHO with the Chief Nursing Officer in place. There are constraints to the plan and we know in our current economic climate there are restraints to a lot of things, but we are trying to get approval for the plan so that we can go forward with an evidence-based approach to nursing development and nursing resource.”
Additionally, Broome noted that another thing they were looking to do in 2018 was address the outdated protocols. She explained that even though sometimes they would have updated protocols in certain cases, she believed what was necessary for the department to do going forward was to monitor these protocols and ensure that professionals were maintaining these protocols.
She added that they would have also started the implementation process of MedData and noted that there were tremendous benefits, such as increased efficiency of professionals at work and throughout the healthcare sector, to be expected.
“There are many benefits attached to MedData and I hope that everyone is supportive of this,” she said.
“It is new and persons at the polyclinics would tell you that it is new and not easy, but it is worth it. You may be a little slower at first, but trust me it’s worth it.”
2018 promises to be a productive one for the healthcare sector.