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CATHERINE W GICHUKI
DOHA
THE Primary Health Care Corporation (PHCC) officials have urged residents to call 107 for appointment bookings at the health centres. This is for proper scheduling of patients in order to serve them better.
Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday, PHCC Assistant Managing Director for Administration and Finance Musallam al Nabit said that the appointment booking would facilitate proper scheduling of patients to serve them better.
Nabit said that they attend to all patients regardless of whether they have appointments or not but booking was necessary.
"We never reject a patient visiting a health centre," he said.
PHCC Director of Operation Department Dr Samya al Abdullah said that the appointment system is also important because some of the specialists are not available at the health centres everyday.
Umm Slal Health Center Manager Dr Nadia Ali said that these days the health centres have adopted triage system to classify the cases on the basis of their seriousness and the time a patient takes before he/she sees a doctor depends on the nature of his/her case.
"It depends on the case. When a patient visits a health centre, the patient is first examined by a nurse who also takes the former's brief history and decides accordingly if the case is urgent/emergency or regular/routine. Whether the patient has appointment or not does not matter," Dr Ali said.
She added,"However, if the case needs urgent attention, the patient is taken to the emergency treatment room and a doctor sees him or her within half an hour. And if the case is a routine one and without appointment, the patient will be seen by a doctor within 150 minutes of the patient's arrival."
According to her, the only difference between one who has appointment and one who has not is that the former can directly proceed to the clinic while the latter will have to be examined first in the nurses' section.
