Taguig launches medical emergency service; Parañaque unveils P200-M hospital annex
MANILA, Philippines – Two southern metro cities are ratcheting up public medical services.
On Monday, the Taguig government started its “Doctors on Call” program in Barangay (village) Lower Bicutan, which is similar to the “911” emergency hotline in the United States.
Under the program, barangay residents can call hotline numbers 225-1833 and 09178210896 for 24/7 help in medical situations needing immediate response and treatment such as heart attacks or injuries caused by accidents or crimes.
The city government’s consultant for the project, Dr. Marie Irene Sy, said the barangay health center has a separate office where a designated medical team will field the calls and could be easily deployed for “rapid emergency medical response, treatment and transport.”
For now, there will be three teams on shift throughout the day. Each team is composed of one doctor, two nurses, and an ambulance driver.
The team will have an ambulance equipped with portable facilities so the team can administer treatment on the spot, or while on the way to the Taguig-Pateros hospital.
Sy said the city government is looking to localize the service per barangay because “we want to be able to respond to emergencies within 10 to 15 minutes.”
“We already have our 24/7 Super Health Centers, free vaccinations and maintenance medicines among many of our health services. DOC is another step to further improve the health services and benefits that we can and will provide for our people,” Taguig Mayor Lani Cayetano said in a statement.
Meanwhile, the Parañaque government unveiled a new P200-million, six-story, 120-bed building at its public hospital on Quirino Avenue, across the street from Saint Andrew’s Cathedral in Barangay La Huerta.
The new building serves as an annex to the old, two-story 39-bed Parañaque Community Hospital. Through a city resolution last March, the new medical compound is now called the Ospital ng Parañaque.
The new hospital building, whose construction began last August, was one of the priority projects of Mayor Edwin Olivarez when he took office last year.
“We are on a fast-track mode with our public health program because our people, particularly the poor, desperately need decent, affordable, and essentially free modern public hospital,” Olivarez said in a statement.
Aside from new facilities, the new hospital wing boasts of additional personnel—a new ophthalmologist and ear, nose and throat specialist, two more gynecologists, two more anesthesiologists and 13 new nurses.
Also in the works is a dialysis unit and a physical therapy unit.
Olivarez did not deny the hospital’s “perennial lack of medicines, supplies and modern equipment,” but vowed to address this through regular appropriations. He also promised to add more trained personnel.
The city government said in a statement that health Secretary Enrique Ona, the guest of honor at Sunday’s inauguration of the new wing, also promised to provide at least P20 million from the health department’s budget next year for the hospital, and another P33 million for the city’s various health centers.
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