| NEWS ARCHIVES |
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| Expanding Singapore's long-term care capabilities |
| 9 Mar 2010 |
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By Claire Huang
Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan has announced a slew of measures to beef up Singapore's long-term care capabilities.
Besides physical expansion such as the building of more acute care facilities like the Khoo Teck Puat Hospital, the government is also boosting staff strength and ramping up nursing home care.
For Evetor Sim, the Health Ministry's announcement to come up with a pre-employment grant for overseas medical students could not have been more timely.
The 19-year-old is due to pursue a medical degree at the University of Manchester in September.
Evetor says her course fees for the 5-year degree will set her parents back by $300,000, so such a grant would be handy.
" I would definitely take into serious consideration the grant, because doing a medical degree overseas is very expensive and the living expenses are also very expensive. So, there'll be a financial burden on parents so I think this grant will definitely ease this burden on parents especially for families that are not well-to-do."
While she intends to return to Singapore after graduating, Evetor admits she might change her mind when she gets used to the lifestyle in UK.
She adds that as far as she knows, there is a large number of Singaporeans studying medicine at her chosen university.
In fact, she says there were some 10 Singaporeans in the last batch of graduates.
Dr Chong Yeh Woei who's the President of the Singapore Medical Council says the initiative will somewhat ease the doctor crunch here.
"We see the problem as there being a shortage of doctors in Singapore because of one, the enlarging population in Singapore and also the aging population. So we welcome this initiative to plug the gap because our local universities I think, although we've enlarged the number of training places, we still cannot meet demands of the years ahead."
" I think with the shortage of doctors, the most important thing is that we can bring in foreign doctors but I believe our local patients still want locally-trained doctors or local doctors to treat them. I think this is because of the cultural context, the languages we speak, so I think the Singaporeans would still prefer to have a Singaporean doctor treating them."
The ministry also has other measures aimed at coping with Singapore's rapidly aging population in the pipeline.
MOH has been trying to recruit more healthcare workers over the past few years.
It set aside $1.5 billion to recruit 7,700 more healthcare staff over 5 years in 2007.
To date, manpower in the industry has gone up by 44 per cent.
This means there is now 8 doctors to 10 beds, up from the previous 6 to 10 ratio.
The nurse to bed ratio has also improved from 20 to 26 nurses per 10 beds.
Staff attrition rates have also gone down says Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan.
He adds that the government is setting aside $120 million to strengthen specialist training programmes over the next 5 years, to enhance the value of a career in the public sector.
Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan notes that there will be a higher demand for transitional care, as more patients require facilities to recuperate.
So the government is working with the Home Nursing Foundation, or HNF, to ramp up operations and extend its services beyond the low-income group, to those with higher-income.
He told parliament that many patients do not need subsidies but may not know how to meet their needs.
Mr Khaw elaborates.
"HNF is working with the Tan Tock Seng team to ensure a smooth handover of patients newly discharged from the hospital. Once the patient is home, Home Nursing Foundation will coordinate with other providers to meet the patient's care needs in the community. We will launch this new initiative within the next couple of months, targeting patients in the central region."
Right now, Singapore has 62 nursing homes serving two per cent of the elderly population.
While this is not excessive, Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan says it's also not "grossly inadequate".
But he noted that performance standards vary so the government will help to upgrade the weaker ones.
The ministry will also raise its financial support for nursing homes by 7 per cent as healthcare costs go up due to the increase in foreign worker levy.
On the country's geriatric care capabilities, Mr Khaw says there's a need to ramp up the number of specialists.
Currently, Singapore has 48 specialist geriatricians and he hopes to increase the number by 30 to 40 per cent over the next three years.
At the same time, the government is pumping an additional $57 million into mental health initiatives.
That's on top of the $123 million already committed.
Part of the new budget will be used to beef up psychiatric nursing manpower.
Another part will be used to set up a long-term monitoring and risk-assessment system.
Mr Khaw admits that while Singapore's follow-up care for the mentally ill has improved, gaps still exist.
"It will help identify and provide support for patients who default follow-up appointments for treatment, thereby reducing the number who relapse because they do not take their medication," says Mr Khaw.
He points out that community support plays a crucial role for this strategy to work.
This spells good news to caregivers like Ms Ivy Lee, whose 84 year-old father is mentally ill.
" My father is wheelchair-bound and we don't drive, and we are actually working and he has a couple of other illnesses. So when we brought this up to the doctor, they arranged for this group to visit my father at home and that really helps us a lot."
Ms Lee says if the Institute of Mental Health didn't have such services, her father would have defaulted on a number of appointments, which could mean a worsening condition.
In his response to MP for Marine Parade GRC Dr Fatimah Lateef, Mr Khaw says the liberalization of Medisave for mental illnesses like schizophrenia and severe depression has seen 500 patients withdraw a total of $160,000 for outpatient treatment over the past 5 months. |