With its facilities boosted, the Bartica Hospital has reduced the number of referrals it sends to the Georgetown Public Hospital by nearly half, the Ministry of Health boasted on Saturday.
Regional Health Officer (RHO) Dr Edward Sagala expressed gratitude for the development of modern medical facilities, especially the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU), which was being commissioned, pointing out that coupled with the trained medical personnel Region Seven is expected to see a further decline in referrals.
“You have kept your word and in less than eight months this hospital has achieved more than we could have expected,” Sagala said to President David Granger who had made a promise to upgrade the facility to a regional hospital, when he took office last year.
Sagala reflected on a case 25 years ago, when he worked there and a mother of seven girls arrived at the hospital to deliver what would have been her eighth baby. He said it was at a time when ultrasounds were a “luxury” so no one was aware that the mother was carrying triplets. “She delivered normally but the last baby was too small. We had to transfer that baby to Georgetown. There was no incubator; there was nothing. We had to make a box and put those warm bottles of water to generate heat and … transfer the patient to Georgetown. The patient survived and those triplets survived so the lady now has 10 girls in the family,” he recalled. “It was a very good experience, but at the same time it gives us real pleasure to see that [we] no longer have to transfer a baby in a box. We have now a state-of-the-art neonatal intensive care unit. This is a dream come true.”
Sagala appealed for routine maintenance and repair of equipment, while at the same time noting that there are plans for Bartica to establish its own biomedical engineering unit. “[Equipment] is expensive to maintain. That is why scheduled maintenance is needed. I always insist on this. We have a very bad habit, we want new things and when they break we want new ones to come. We need to… [maintain] the equipment and check them whether they have problems or not and in that way we can save the equipment. Money is hard to come by,” he asserted.
And while he was proud to inform that staffing at the facility has grown from four junior doctors to 16, seven of whom are specialists, he urged them to use compassion and treat their patients with positive attitudes of service.
“We need to look at patients in a holistic manner. Get to know your patients… so you see that it is not only a disease they come to you with. Some of them want someone to hear from you. We have a serious attitude problem and we need to address that, we seriously need to address that,” he added.
He also pointed out that there are six other doctors in Region Seven—two are stationed at Kamarang, two will be in Issano by next week, one at Waramadong and one at Imbaimadai.
The 22 medical practitioners in Region Seven include specialists in dermatology, ear nose and throat, cardiology, obstetrics and gynaecology, paediatrics, general surgery and anaesthesiology.
The Bartica Hospital will soon offer additional services such as the provision of medical imaging, dentistry, pharmacy, physiotherapy and environmental health among others. “We intend to become one of the best regional hospitals in the country,” Sagala posited.
The RHO appealed to persons to adopt sections of the hospital as the facility needs all the help it can get. “You can adopt the maternity ward; you can adopt the paediatric ward we need help,” he said.
Guyana Help the Kids (GHTK) President Dr Narendra Singh, who has led the cause in collaborating with the Ministry of Health to reduce infant mortality in the country, stressed the importance of investing in training for medical personnel and overall education of the populace. He echoed the importance of the maintenance of equipment “…Wherever babies are born we have to give them a fighting chance and that begins with education,” he said.
Singh who is also a paediatrician by profession, informed that his organization has trained 10 paediatricians and 30 NICU nurses who are serving the Georgetown Public Hospital and regional hospitals. Through a partnership with government the organization has established six NICUs at the public hospitals in Georgetown, Linden, New Amsterdam, West Demerara, Suddie and Bartica.
Earlier in the day, President Granger had recalled the sentimental memories he had of Bartica, reminiscing about when he was three years old and his father held him in his arms and showed him the hospital where his mother had been admitted to deliver the seventh of his siblings. He pointed out that Dr Norton knows of his concerns about child mortality and his vision that no matter the cost, “sooner or later there must be a National Maternity Hospital.” The NICU at Bartica was just one step towards this goal.
“We want to ensure there are zero maternal deaths, zero. Not just reduce the deaths of our babies, but zero …There should be no reason in 2016 why babies have to die,” the President said.
