LINGAYEN, PANGASINAN—”I’m prioritizing healthcare right now in light of the full implementation of the universal healthcare law,” Governor Ramon V. Guico III said.
As such, the governor stated his administration had pushed for various projects on health for the last two years to cater to the needs of the sick and less privileged Pangasinenses.
Citing his experience when he had a major operation early this year, Gov. Guico disclosed the agony and hardship he went through during that period.
“Ang hirap po talaga magkasakit. Personally, naranasanko yan,” he stated as he further said that if hardship can knock him down, what more in the plight of the less fortunate members of society? “Dumaan pa ako sapaghihirap, meaning the pain, the agony. And siyempre, undergoing surgery is so hard for me. Now, paano yungmga kababayan nating walang-wala, pag nagkasakit sila, saan sila pupunta,” he further cited.
Hence, the provincial chief executive revealed that he is actively pushing and promoting the full implementation of the e-Konsulta of PhilHealth, or the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation. Through this, he explained, Pangasinenses can avail of the preventive care program of the government.
For the past two years of his tenure, the improvement of the 14 government hospitals in the province became one of the priorities of the provincial government.
In the early part of his term from July to December 2022, intensive planning was done to include the creation of the Provincial Hospital Management Services Office (PHMSO), which was created to standardize the operations of the hospitals and to improve the quality of health services offered to the over 3.3 million Pangasinenses through careful regulation and monitoring.
Along with the improvement of all government facilities, the provincial government is continuously purchasing more state-of-the-art equipment, such as MRI (magnetic resonance imaging); seven brand new CT (computed tomography) scans; 19 X-ray machines; and 22 ultrasound machines, which were spread across the 14 hospitals of the province.
Disclosing that the provincial government has given priority to the physical power plant of the hospitals, Gov. Guico cited that the province purchased a four-hectare property to build a modern community hospital in Umingan.
Once completed, the 55-bed capacity community hospital in Umingan, with a total funding of P200 million, will not only serve the populace residing in the 58 villages there but can cater to other patients from neighboring towns of Natividad, San Nicolas, and Rosales and even the neighboring province of Nueva Ecija as well.
In addition, the province also acquired a two-hectare lot in Tayug to augment the Eastern Pangasinan District Hospital (EPDH).
Recently, Gov. Guico led the groundbreaking in Lingayen District Hospital for a new building to be constructed.
To complement all these, the provincial government hired 471 medical staff to be deployed in various hospitals. These consist of doctors, nurses, medical technologists, and pharmacists, among others.
The establishment of a genome center in the province is likewise in the offing. “We’ve put budget for it for next year. And it’s going to be—if not the first—it’s among the first three in the country,” the governor added.
Genomics is the study of all a person’s genes (the genome), including interactions of those genes with each other and also with the person’s environment. (Ruby F. Rayat/PIMRO)
