Health Screening Visit No 1

Ram had an appointment for health screening at a government specialist clinic located in a hospital across town. Her appointment was for 10.00 am and knowing the condition of the hospital, always overcrowded with out-patients, we tried to arrive at the hospital early. But it was not to be. We got caught in two traffic jams on the way that delayed our arrival but were just in time though.

The hospital has gone on-line. Everything is supposed to be computerized. Many advantages to be derived from this computerization exercise but was it successful? Yes, maybe…… and maybe it is taking a little too long to achieve all the desired results but the exercise is surely beneficial not withstanding…… This is a specialist hospital, remember…..

The next day Ram and I visited the government community health centre for our general health screening, the health institution we go to before there is, or if there is, a need to go to the specialist hospital.

I spied a few things that I thought need mentioning. I dropped Ram at the foyer of the hospital for her to go in and register herself while I went to park the car. It was apparent that there was a big crowd of outpatients that day as it was difficult to find a parking space even in the very large underground parking lot. She was still not registered by the time I get to her and it was a good 45 minutes by the time Ram’s number was called. She only had about 20 patients ahead of her. Apparently each outpatient will take approximately three minutes to be registered, and electronically at that. After registration she has to report at the proper clinic, in Ram’s case the ‘gyne’ clinic, and again reporting, electronically of course, took a while. She was given a new queue number. It was then the waiting game again.

Finding a seat in the large waiting lounge was easy but because of the large crowd the available seats are far at the back. Ram has her new queue number but the nurse chose to call the patients by name instead of keying the number on the queue number screen! The crowd is made up of various people, the elderly couples, the young and not so young couples, families with young children and with the parents not bothered that their children run around, true to the behaviors of young children without doubt not able to sit still even for a short while, and bothering others! In the obvious din of the present crowd one has to strain to hear one’s name being called by the obviously bothered nurse! It was indeed a runaway from the ease that electronics were supposed to provide!

Finally Ram’s name was called, a good two and a half hours after the appointed time, to see the medical specialist. She was in for about fifteen minutes. Her records were electronically kept of course and the specialist had fingers on the electronic keyboard most of the period Ram was there. A few questions were asked of course, to see if everything is ok and then it was decided that Ram continues with the same previously prescribed medicine. So she received the medicine prescription from the specialist, I wondered why this was not done electronically, and off we went to the pharmacy which was on the same floor with the clinic. She has to register her prescription and again was given a queue number, and another waiting game began. By the time she received her medicine it was past lunch time.

It took us about four hours for a fifteen minutes consultation! electronically handled at that! Well, it does not appear as though things have improved does it?

In my following post let us see how the general health screening visit at the community health center went, its not computerized, and compare it with the specialist hospital…..

MKI Ramblings Unlimited
Petaling Jaya