Streamlining doctor access for Atoll Hospital referrals

A system to ease the process of referring patients from Atoll Hospitals instead of island health centres to doctors in Male' is currently being arranged. This process will also allow for easier access to doctors and doctor appointments. This was announced by the Male' City Group of Hospitals.

During a Majlis committee hearing, North Galholhu Constituency MDP member Mohamed Ibrahim (Kudoo) raised the patient referral issue. In response, CEO of the Male' City Group of Hospitals Ibrahim Haleem stated that there are discussions being held with the Ministry of Health to remedy the issues that people who travel from islands face when they want to consult a doctor about their illnesses.

The process of consulting doctors at Atoll hospitals and the process of trying to find a doctor in Male' when a referral is put out by Atoll hospitals is currently not optimized and is being looked into to try and improve the situation, says Haleem.

"Patients will already have been looked at by a doctor. This would ease the process of pairing up the patient with the relevant specialist, with this filtering process allowing for arranging doctors appointments much easier," Haleem said.

Haleem goes on to say that outreach programs are currently underway where Male' based doctors makes visits to hospitals in various islands. This would also decrease the number of patients that would need to make the trip to Male' for medical assistance.

Dr. Aminath Zeyba Ahmed, Medical Director of IGMH said that with the advent of tele-medicine, the difficulties experienced by atoll-based patients, where tests take a long time or not being able to see a doctor, can somewhat be mitigated.

This procedure is being readied for use in Haa Dh. Kulhudhuffushi and F. Nilandhoo.

"These will be high-end sophisticated systems and are being made in conjunction with the Ministry of Health. With these systems, we will be able to clearly hear what's going on inside a lung when a stethoscope is being used, along with heartbeats as well. A very high-end system," Dr. Zeyba states.

"Our plan is this: For example, if a patient has finished an appointment with a cardiologist and is awaiting review, we can do the review remotely through to the hospital the patient is at. Then we can set up a timetable where we can conduct weekly patient reviews with the power of telemedicine. This will also allow patients to easily have access to specialists at the relevant days they are available. Telemedicine will function much like an OPD (Outpatient Department)."

Currently, the Atoll hospitals are the only ones doing referrals to Male' doctors. Some health centers in some islands do however do referrals directly as well.