Last week we listened to VOB92.9 radio referring to sources that the government plans to reopen the St. Joseph Hospital. We don’t have to remind the BU family about the political football which was played by the previous government concerning this issue. The end result was that a multi-million dollar facility was left to go to ruin and the reputation of Senator Branford Taitt was impaled.
BU’s resident medical Guru Dr. Georgie Porgie has been calling for the expansion of the Polyclinic services to disperse the concentration of demand from the Queen Elizabeth Hospital. Porgie’s recommendation would have been given the thumbs down recently by the new Minister of Health Donville Inniss. BU agrees in principle with Dr. Porgie’s hub and spoke solution for healthcare in Barbados, our issue is that we can’t see how the government can allocate the required resources to make it work i.e. financial and staff.
One of the burning issues in healthcare in Barbados has been the efficient staffing of our health system by our nurses. Over the years Barbados has developed a good reputation by its healthcare professionals, especially our nurses. The former government instituted a major policy change at the hospital by shifting to a Board of Directors. The process required that the tenure of nurses be transferred to a new arrangement. In the process we understand many of our precious nurses were lost for one reason or the other.
The former government responded to the situation by expanding the capacity of the local Community College to supply nurses in the medium term. It is our understanding that it takes 3 years to prepare a nurse for the system. In the short term the former government was forced to recruit nurses from outside Barbados, notably from the Philippines and St. Vincent. Our concern about the news that the current government plans to start spending money on the St. Joseph Hospital is on several fronts.
Barbados has built-up a healthcare service over the years which has served the country well. In the last decade it is obvious our healthcare has started to molder. Before any major decision is taken to resurrect the St. Joseph Hospital, the government should be driven by a declared strategic plan for healthcare delivery in Barbados. Already the government has committed to spending a vast sum to fix the QEH, we have the Polyclinics which need to be integrated optimally into our healthcare system, what about the District Hospitals and the Psychiatric Hospital? More importantly is the quality of the healthcare professionals we need to manage and train to ensure that the legacy of our superior healthcare is sustained.
BU sources have confirmed that that the three shifts worked by nurses at the QEH is currently under stress i.e. 7AM-3PM, 3PM-11PM, 11PM-7AM. It appears that if one shift does not routinely work overtime to overlap with the incoming shift the healthcare at the QEH specifically would become seriously compromised. BU is deeply appreciative to the RN’s for the commitment they have been making to keep our healthcare ticking over. Our sources have have also confirmed that the flow of qualified nurses from the Community College has not been meeting the original projection.
We understand that about 50% of nursing students qualified from the last batch from Community College was an improvement from the previous year where the number was about 25%. The situation had become so critical that there was high-level discussion last year to introduce the student nurses who failed the RN examination into the healthcare system until they were able to pass.
It drives us to ask the questions:
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Is the qualifying examination (RN) at Community College too difficult to pass?
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Is the prerequisite qualification for the student nurse (Associate Degree from Community College) too easy to acquire?
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Are the teaching methods at Community College adequate?
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A combination of all the above?
Against this background we are deeply concerned at the sound-bite approach currently engaged by the government to healthcare strategy. BU has been lamenting that there are some issues of national importance which require a bi-partisan approach, and healthcare is one at the top of the list. Surely we cannot afford to repeat our mistakes in this sector.
We need to stop playing political football with our healthcare system. The health of any nation is the wealth of the nation.
The blogmaster invites you to join the discussion.