DOHA: In future, people in Qatar may be able to access emergency care over telephone, as recommended by the five-year National Primary Healthcare Strategy, which was launched yesterday.
“Some international evidence suggests medical advice by phone can solve some health needs… Each primary healthcare provider is free to develop urgent phone services as they feel fit,” says the strategy document.
The telephone service has been recommended as a way to provide faster care and reduce the burden on hospitals.
“Currently Qatar’s urgent care provision is not functioning as effectively as it could. Hamad Hospital’s Emergency Department has 1,300 to 1,600 attendees every day and approximately half of these patients could be treated in primary health centres,” says the document.
Primary health centres have been asked to establish a patient helpline to help people get the care they need. It is also recommended that nurses should be available to assess people walking into health centres with urgent care needs.
The face-to-face or over-the-phone nurse assessment will allow people to be directed to the most appropriate service.
The strategy also recommends that urgent care treatment rooms be established in every health centre with the required facilities.
With establishment of three hospitals and several primary health centres exclusively for labourers by 2015, urgent care needs of this segment of the population will be met by these facilities.
Uniformed public servants and security guards at shopping malls will be trained in first aid as part of the strategy. Training has already started for public sector frontline workers, including police and civil defence personnel.
Training should include the use of defibrillators — machines that give a mild electric shock to stimulate the heart following a heart attack — which should be placed at public places such as shopping malls.
The Peninsula
