HERE’S another one from the Inbox.
Dear Mr. Valleser,
I have been an employee at the JR Borja Memorial City Hospital for the past nine years. Many of my co-employees would like to take exemption from your insinuations that our city hospital is not doing the services it is intended to do. Since the first day of my employment, I have been told that this is a hospital for the poor in line with the vision of Mayor Vicente Emano.
We have innovations as a response to the need of hospital care for our people. But maybe you do not know because I am sure you would go to a better hospital when sick. In fact, the city hospital is serving patients not only from the city but also from other municipalities.
You mentioned in your colum something that can be done to improve our services like closing down the out patient department. It is a good idea but you are already late. Mayor Emano has already done that. And also, we do not welcome the idea of a ‘‘cooperative hospital’’ as this will interrupt our years of service. We would also lose our pay.
Please be informed that we are happy with the hospital as it is.
A Concerned Employee
Dear Concerned Employee,
If you are really convinced on the vision of Mayor Dongkoy Emano on the hospital and that you are really concerned about the poor patients that you serve, the best way you can help the poor patients is to tell them to check out immediately and be confined elsewhere.
You have enough years with the city hospital. I guess it was Mayor Dongkoy who appointed you. You are indeed a grateful employee to the point that you still call him ‘‘mayor’’ and not vice mayor; he is inutile as a vice mayor, and he is the highest paid 15/30 local official in the whole country today. But this is another issue, an issue of competence of an elective office to his position.
Yes, you’re correct that an order was already issued by ‘‘Mayor’’ Emano to close the out-patient department, limit regular checkups and normal births to the health centers. Are you really convinced this is being done? Intention without the execution is ‘‘all sound and fury signifying nothing. Zero, nada, zilch!
I heard a news report from the radio supposedly about Councilor Dante Pajo saying that everybody is welcome to apply for work at the city hospital. How I wish the story was ‘‘everybody is welcome to be confined at the city hospital with its modern facilities and dedicated staff.’’
This brings two questions to mind: A) Did Councilor Pajo say that because there is no other good point of being employed at the city hospital except the pay? B) Are there more resignations from doctors and nurses that he is now calling for new applicants?
But I guess the letter of our ‘‘Concerned Employee’’ gives us the answer to the first question––anything can happen to the city hospital as long as the employees’ security of tenure and pay is protected. What a wonderful vision and working values our city officials are imparting to the city employees, indeed! Table Talk By JAY VALLESER Updated July 7, 2009
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I cannot understand how closing the out-patient department can improve services at City Hospital unless the City is doing this as a damage control measure. Shouldn’t the City Officials who are supposed to be in-charge of Health be pro-active rather than reactive?
Unloading patients for outpatient consult to the Health Centers is really not a sound idea. For one, not all Health Centers have regular physicians who sit in for consultation. Most of the time only a midwife or a nurse who are themselves busy seeing to the implementation of DOH programs which are usually preventative in nature are the ones left to man the centers.
Speaking of which, compared to other Health Centers in nearby towns, the performance of our own Health Centers are wanting. This reveals the degree of attention and concern that is being given by the City Government to issues concerning health.
A local government who does not think that health is a priority, may I say, is misguided and ill-advised. A local government who would think of improving hospital services as a waste of City resources but would rather throw away the people’s taxes on infrastructures and projects that are ill-planned without even batting an eyelash speaks of one that does not really think of the people’s needs but more of its pockets.
By the way, to the hospital employee who seems contented with his nine years of service, you may be contented with the way you served as a hospital employee but you don’t speak for the whole hospital. Are you even directly involved in health services? Maybe not, otherwise, you have been blind these past nine years. Are you for real?
The situation at the city hospital continues to spiral into a whirlpool of deterioration and neglect. I believe the first step to correct this should be a city leadership that has a HEART for JRBGH. The city hospital should be an issue for the coming 2010 elections. we need city leaders who will genuinely allow the hospital to grow; who have the HEART to allow the hospital to become what it really should be: a haven for the sick, a refuge for the ailing, a center of wellness for all. For Cagayan de Oro, a city in bloom, does not deserve a primary level hospital. Patients: speak out. Cagay-anons: vote wisely. I will.