Health Minister Terrence Deyalsingh said the Ministry of Health has taken seriously the recommendations made in the report of the committee appointed to investigate the factors contributing to clinical outcomes of covid19 patients in Trinidad and Tobago.
At Saturday’s virtual covid19 health update, Deyalsingh said among the first order of business were improving working conditions for staff, overall communications, meals and data management.
“Moving forward, data management is going to be critical, and I am glad that the committee raised it. At the Ministry of Health, we have a national policy now on how we digitise the entire healthcare system.”
“One of the priorities now is to actually operationalise the digitisation of all aspects of delivery of healthcare which would redound to benefit of our patients and frontline staff and start to move away from paper and pen.”
The report also addressed concerns about staff shortages and accommodation in which it stated, “Staff shortages were common. There were complaints at every level about the shortage of staff. These levels ranged from executive management to doctors and nurses to orderlies and patient escorts.”
It also pointed out that “At some RHAs, some of the staff in the frontline felt abandoned by the leadership.”
The report recommended the implementation of a specific feedback system to monitor the needs of the staff on the frontline to deal with the issue.
Deyalsingh said while there were no established protocols for a nurse-to-patient ratio, the ministry and staff at the medical facilities handled the pandemic well.
“There are no more persons to hire. We hired 1,500 or 1,700. In my view the RHAs and we did a reasonable job in handling a global pandemic, for which there is no blueprint, for which the world had no previous experience, except 1918. We continue to monitor it and we continue to find ways to deal with this,” he said.
[caption id="attachment_940597" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Health Minister Terrence Deyalsingh addresses health workers at Couva hospital in February 2021. - FILE PHOTO/MARVIN HAMILTON[/caption]
As for staff accommodation, Deyalsingh said based on the report the data would be used to improve the RHAs that were lagging.
The report also recommended an increased use of Tocilizumab, given its efficacy rate to treat covid19 patients.
It said, “Tocilizumab is given at an advanced stage of covid19. Most staff were very impressed by its effects and perhaps C40 needs to increase purchasing of this drug.
“Though it is an expensive drug there is a cost-benefit to be realized from its use. We recommend that the policy regarding Tocilizumab use be reviewed.
Chief Medical Officer Dr Roshan Parasaram said the use of Tocilizumab on covid19 patients was being done according to covid19 guidelines, but the cost factor was something that has to be considered.
He explained that there was a fair supply of the drug in TT prior to the pandemic which was being used to treat rheumatoid arthritis.
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