Diagnosing health

THE COMMISSION of Inquiry into the public health services comes as quite a surprise since we are not aware of any ongoing crisis in that area or any serious deficiency that is not being actively addressed. Out of the blue, it seems, Prime Minister Patrick Manning announced the appointment of the five-man Commission in a statement to the House of Representatives last Friday. It may well be, of course, that Mr Manning knows much more than we do, so we can only wait and see what will emerge and what will result from this exercise.

In explaining his decision to appoint the inquiry, the PM cited intensifying complaints about inadequacies in the delivery of health services and attendant care. As far as we can recall, however, complaints about the health services can be traced back over decades, including times when the poor treatment at public hospitals provoked public outcries. According to Mr Manning, however, these intensifying complaints have led to calls for “investigations into a number of questionable incidents occurring at public health institutions, including some which have resulted in questionable deaths.”

There is no denying that such “questionable incidents” have occasionally occurred at the country’s major public hospitals, but we wonder why the PM now sees the need for a Commission of Inquiry to deal effectively with such cases. Surely, it should be the urgent and bounden responsibility of the medical directorate of  each institution to investigate such incidents and to resolve them to the satisfaction of  those involved and in the interest of the public at large. We know that in a number of cases, such as the problem at the neo-natal clinic of the Mt Hope Hospital, such action was in fact taken. In spite of the “intensifying complaints” that Mr Manning talks about, the Inquiry comes at a time when the country’s health services seem at last to be on the road to significant improvement, thanks largely to the wide ranging decisions and measures taken by former Health Minister Colmn Imbert and the energetic follow-up action of incumbent John Rahael.

The general public, in fact, are seeing and benefiting from these improvements including an expansion of health care into rural areas, employment of more professionals including Cuban doctors who, according to reports, are winning the confidence of patients, stepped-up programmes for the training of nurses, the availability of drugs at pharmacies for out patients and the installation of vital life-sustaining equipment which, previously, was accessible only at private clinics. Indeed, only recently the Minister announced a programme intended to make costly heart by-pass surgery available at public hospitals for the general public.

We have no wish to argue about the PM’s concern over these “questionable incidents” in the health services and the Commission of Inquiry he has initiated may well shed some useful light into the operations of our public hospitals and produce some worthwhile recommendations. As far as we are concerned, however, the need now is for enhancing the management of the service and accelerating implementation of the improvements and reforms already in train. The diagnosis is known, the medication must now be administered.