A push for more specialized care centers outside of NCR

If there is one lesson we learned after the World Health Organization (WHO) has officially declared that Covid-19 is no longer a global health emergency, it is how important a medical infrastructure is to our lives — the barangay health centers, quarantine and vaccination sites, general hospitals, maternity clinics, specialized care centers, etc. The presence — or absence — of such structure in a neighborhood is not only glaring during a pandemic or health emergencies, but also has an impact on the overall well-being of a population.

In the Philippine Health Facility Development Plan 2020-2040 published by the Department of Health (DOH), it has acknowledged that Filipinos are getting healthier through the years but admitted that there are still challenges; one of them is the lack of specialized care centers, especially in the provinces.

The DOH said that while core facilities (health stations, primary care facilities, and hospitals) are meant to provide care for the majority of patients, some patients “require specialized care from facilities with capability to cater to specific patient populations for particular procedures and overall care.” These are the “specialized care centers.”

In order to access these specialized care centers, one will wish to live in Quezon City (QC). Why not? Almost all these specialized care centers are located along East Avenue in QC — the Philippine Heart Center, National Kidney and Transplant Institute, Lung Center of the Philippines, and Philippine Children’s Medical Center. Also in QC is the Philippine Orthopedic Hospital in Banawe Street.

Given this situation, a patient from Jolo, for example, who will need bone surgery will not only worry about the operation but also agonize over finding transient homes or rental apartments in QC for his recovery and rehabilitation. It’s another layer of cost in an already costly procedure. It’s another burden that pushes indigent patients deeper into debt and poverty.

So, why not bring a specialized care center to Jolo? Or to more cities, towns, and barangays outside of the National Capital Region?

That is the impetus of the bill that was recently approved on third (and final) reading in the House with an overwhelming 257 votes. House Bill (HB) No. 7751, or the proposed Department of Health Specialty Centers Act, “aims to expand healthcare services by establishing specialized care centers in hospitals under the supervision and control of the DOH.”

Speaker Ferdinand Martin G. Romualdez, one of the principal authors, said the establishment of these facilities “would make specialized health care accessible to our people in the provinces, especially the poor.”

“We have specialty hospitals built during the time of the father of the President… but all of these are in QC. So our people in the regions and in Visayas and Mindanao who need the services of these health facilities will have to travel all the way to QC to avail of their services,” he said. “We need more specialty centers, not necessarily rising to the level of a hospital like those in QC, to treat and care for our people requiring specialized health care in the provinces.”

HB No. 7751 also mandates the DOH to “establish these centers in select hospitals under its supervision and control. At least one center shall be put in place in every region within five years from the enactment of the bill.”

The passage of this bill is a welcome development considering that many Filipinos are now suffering from heart, kidney, and lung ailments. Let us compel the government to nurture the sick by bringing healthcare facilities nearer to where they live and need to heal.

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