A&E Dept. at OKEUH Set For Major Changes in 2023! 

Chief executive officer, Dr. Dexter James announced on Tuesday that Millennium Heights Medical Complex would be making serious changes to operations in 2023. He presented a year in review of 2022 to local media, and after highlighting the achievements of MHMC, he closed in on the challenges the Complex faces, and the shortcomings documented in patient feedback. 

At the top of the list was waiting times in the Accident & Emergency Department (AED) and Outpatient Clinic at Owen King EU Hospital (OKEUH) for patients triaged as requiring non-urgent care and one or more diagnostic investigations. These patients, he highlighted, spend three or more hours in the emergency department because resources must be deployed to manage more urgent and life-threatening conditions first. Dr. James stated that long waiting times for such care is not unusual in healthcare worldwide, but his management team has been working on some creative ways to alleviate the issue. This includes processing these non-urgent patients quicker so that bottlenecks and patient flow can be improved.

He explained that patients seen in AED are sorted into five categories based on the severity of their medical condition. Of these categories, one and two are the most life-threating conditions, which include patients with injuries from accidents and violence, heart attacks and asthmatics, to name a few, while categories four and five are the least urgent. 

“We must accept the reality that the emergency room is a dynamic environment. Patients are not seen on a first come, first serve basis but based on the doctor’s assessment on the severity of your medical condition and then seen in that order. Our emergency room receives a lot of negative goodwill around waiting times and communications, but we will be placing some emphasis with resources to try and improve on these issues,” Dr. James shared. 

The CEO outlined MHMC’s programme for the year which was developed around the theme “People First” with an aim at improving service quality excellence. Some of these plans include: reduction in wait times for non-urgent care at AED, improvement in interpersonal communications with patients, scheduled family meetings and psychosocial support for patients and the creation of a one-stop shop for all admission and billings. Dr. James announced the upcoming reopening of the outpatient dispensing services. 

Dr. James said, “I can assure the public that just under 1,100 of us here will work hard to make the Complex the best place to work, the best place to practice medicine and the best place to receive care. That is our mandate and our commitment to the population.”