THE Health Ministry will six measures to address various issues related to health services and facilities to ensure the provision of best health services to the people, said Health Minister Dr Dzulkefly Ahmad.

He said the first step was to raise the capacity of public hospitals by building new facilities and upgrading the existing ones.

In 2010, there were 137 hospitals and medical institutions under the Health Minister, and the number increased to 145 hospitals in 2016.

“The second measure is to improve daycare services in hospital to reduce congestion in inpatient admissions and waiting time for treatment. To realise this goal the ministry has built nine daycare centres that provide similar facilities and medicines,” he said in an exclusive interview with Bernama here recently.

Dr Dzulkefly said another step was to have more collaboration between government hospitals and universities.

“As of now, 22 public hospitals have collaborated with local universities.

“The result of this collaboration has made public hospital a training centre for medical specialists and students from the universities. Some examples of the collaboration are between Tapah Hospital in Perak and Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman, and Tanjung Karang Hospital in Selangor with Mahsa University,” he said.

Dr Dzulkefly said the fourth measure was to have an appointment system for patients to see doctors, which would also reduce congestion at the clinic and waiting time.

“The fifth measure is to forge cluster hospital collaboration between specialist hospitals and non-specialist hospitals to increase access to specialised services to people in rural areas.

“Among the government hospitals involved in this collaboration are Melaka Hospital, Hospital Jasin and Alor Gajah Hospital,” he said.

Dr Dzulkefly said the sixth measure was to improve the efficiency in handling patients’ waiting process with it being effective in reducing long waiting time for patients.

He said such measures could improve the quality of services at government hospitals in the future. – Bernama, June 10, 2018.