81,000 seek help at Sando hospital

This was 19,000 more than the number of emergency cases at the hospital in 2015, South West Regional Authority (SWRHA) chief executive officer Anil Gosine disclosed yesterday.

“Ap p r ox i m a t e l y 81,000 clients accessed services at San Fernando General Hospital’s emergency department in 2016, which reflects an increase in emergency visits from 61,291 in 2015,” Gosine said.

He was addressing an Emergency Medicine Conference billed, Emergency medicine and You, hosted by the TT Association of Emergency Physicians & Surgeons at San Fernando City Hall Auditorium, Harris Promenade.

The influx at the SFGH was even greater the patient visits at the Point Fortin Area Hospital, Couva, Princes Town and Siparia district health facilities which recorded respective estimates of 60,000, 55,000, 45,000 and 36,000 emergency visits.

The increase overall crossed 20,000.

“In the last fiscal year, we recognised that there has been an increase in total emergency visits at the emergency departments by 26,000 persons,” Gosine revealed.

“I can assure you all that we are committed to improving the quality of our healthcare delivery services at our emergency departments,” he said. “We are working on reducing waiting times developing techniques to avoid overcrowding at busy periods and enhancing the injury surveillance system at the SFGH emergency department.” SWRHA emergency department head Dr Robin Sinanan said the authority was looking at developing a hotline to help people seeking medical attention, as well as create a trauma registry to track cases such as injuries due to fireworks.

In his presentation on fireworks injuries, Dr Justin Sookram said the hospital’s emergency department had a steady increase in these injuries which occurred during the Divali, Christmas and New Year’s holidays.

Using graphic photographs of fireworks-related injuries, Sookram said 11 serious cases were recorded at SFGH in 2015 with 19 cases last year, none of which was reported to the police.