LINGAYEN, PANGASINAN—Gov. Ramon V. Guico III said he wants to build 20 government hospitals in the province.
In his third State of the Province Address (SOPA) during the province’s 455th Foundation Day last April 5, the governor said: “My dream is not to stop at 14 government hospitals. If you give me three terms as a governor, at least 20 hospitals should be operating in the province under the provincial government of Pangasinan.”
Gov. Guico said this will include the establishments of a training hospital, an APEX hospital and specialty hospitals.
An Apex hospital is a specialized hospital contracted by the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation as a stand-alone facility that offers services for a wide range of illnesses, diseases, injuries, or deformities.
At the minimum, an apex hospital shall be equipped with an ambulatory surgical clinic, anatomic and clinical laboratory. It will also have a blood station, dialysis facility, general intensive care unit, nuclear medicine facility, physical medicine and rehabilitation facility, psychiatry facility, radiologic facilities, and surgical facility as well as maternity facility.
“For the first time, we engaged in improving medical and hospital services that were never before achieved in such a scale that we have initiated and accomplished in less than three years, including many of those that are still works in progress,” he said.
Earlier, the provincial government has started the put up of a 55-bed super community hospital in Umingan. To date, Phase 1 of the P200 million project has been completed.
The Umingan hospital is expected to be completed at year end. It will have two elevators to service senior citizens and people with disability. The facility is a 15-bed community hospital that can only service some 50 patients.
Recently, the province in partnership with the municipality of Alcala held the groundbreaking ceremony for the construction of the 15th government hospital.
The four-story hospital which will have a P250 million budget for Phase 1, will cater not only to residents of Alcala but also to citizens of nearby towns. The town actually donated the 3,000 square meter lot where the hospital will be built on in Barangay Poblacion.
Through his legacy project — GUICONSULTA, more than one million Pangasinenses can now enjoy the benefits of the national government’s PhilHealth’s Konsulta Program.
“We want free comprehensive outpatient primary care, medical consultations, health risk screening, selected laboratory tests and medicines for all eligible and registered Pangasinenses through Konsulta,” he said.
In less than three years, Gov. Guico, has made healthcare as one of his major programs. He has also seen to the establishment of other health facilities like hemodialysis centers; purchase of various state-of-the-art equipment; the additional hiring of health practitioners and the provision of specialized trainings for doctors and nurses. (Ruby F. Rayat/PIMRO)
