Philippine Healthcare System: Why is it far from the ideal?
April 20th, 2008 by manelialeeEmergency Room Setting
In Australia, I accompanied somebody who has a tummy ache in the emergency room, a triage nurse was there to entertain us. She asked us details like medicare and stuff. Next, the triage nurse examined the patient,(vital signs and stuff) the patient had a low grade fever so she gave paracetamol and asked us to wait in the waiting area. An hour has passed the tummy ache was gone and were not seen by a doctor. Other emergency patients were seen first. We then decided to go home. We told the triage nurse that we will go home already because the pain is gone. She said okie. So off we went home. No payments needed
In the Philippines, a typical emergency room setting would be the nurse getting the details of the patient, then wait for a doctor to see them, real emergency cases comes first, followed by opd patients. Most people wait because usually its their 3rd-4th day of illness. Then payment would be asked from the patient
In the Australian setting, at the first sign of illness people go to the hospital or have themselves checked up at once because health services is within their reach. Health is stressed in every advertisement you see and prevention is their main focus.
In the Philippine setting, people tend to wait until what their illenesses are already worse often than not when you asked them why did they bring their patients just now, the usual reply would be "Wala po kasing pera" then when asked bakit ngayon ba may pera na? "Wla pa rin po" Sad, but true.
There could be a lot of root causes - poverty, low budget of the government for health, brain drain and a lot more. But I guess, the question is what can we do to make our Health System ideal?
As doctors, we should not only treat the disease but the whole patient (FCM ba ang dating?) Let us educate our patients that Health is Wealth. A lot of illnesses could be easily managed if seen early. Proper diet and lifestyle changes should always be part of the management.
