Hopeton Maternity Health Centre set for August reopening

WESTERN BUREAU:

HOPETON MATERNITY Health Centre, located in the hills of eastern St James, will be restored and reopened before August 6, when the country celebrates its 60th anniversary of Independence, says Lennox Wallace, manager at the St James Health Services.

Wallace gave that assurance following calls by both Edmund Bartlett, the member of parliament (MP) for St James East Central, and residents of the communities of Hampton and Hopeton, for the facility to be rehabilitated and returned to full operations.

“It was a first-class facility and I want to assure the community that before August, the facility will be up and running. The community needs it. And based on our assessment from our public health nurses and community health aides, the facility is needed,” Wallace said.

According to him, the centre, which was opened in the 1970s, was forced to close its doors 12 years ago because the population at the time was low, coupled with the fact that persons had to leave their homes very early to get into Montego Bay for work, long before the facility’s opening time.

“We also had a water situation there, and the take-up of the services offered was not very great, therefore, a decision was taken to close it,” Wallace said in a Gleaner interview this week.

He noted that it was not feasible at that time to have a full-time staff because most of those persons from the community and its environs would leave to Montego Bay and access healthcare services at Montego Bay Type Five and at the Catherine Hall health centres, in an effort not to be late for work.

Over time, he said the population has increased significantly, igniting the need for the reopening of the health centre, coupled with the fact that the population at Buckingham All-Age School is returning to face-to-face classes.

“With the return of face-to face schools, it becomes even more important that if a child should be injured or become ill, they can be treated there, instead of travelling between 10 and 15 miles to the Granville Health Centre and Type Five,” the St James Health Services manager said.

“If students get injured, the nearest health centre now is Granville, so it’s imperative that we have that health facility open to ensure the community is properly served,” Wallace noted.

He revealed that Bartlett, who is also the minister of tourism, has committed some funds to St James health services to help restore the facility.

“We are now in the process of doing the drawings in the technical department to see where we can improve and expand to ensure that we have a brand new facility in short order,” he informed.

Last Friday, Bartlett called for the rehabilitation and reopening of the Hopeton Maternity Health Centre while speaking at the handover ceremony for the Barrett Town Community Centre, which was rehabilitated at a cost of $43.8 million.

STATE OF DISREPAIR

In appealing for the facilities return to full operation, the MP noted that Hopeton was in a state of disrepair.

“We really want to get that unit back on track for the services in that rural part of Jamaica to be restored. We have the mother and child unit that was established so long ago that it is really in need of attention in the Hopeton area,” Bartlett said of the shuttered Hopeton Maternity Centre.

Up to the time of its closing, the facility, built in the 1970s, was classified as a type one health centre.

“It has a huge number of medical records for hundreds of children that were born in that area,” said Bartlett.

Retired community health aide, Neceeta Brodie, related fond experiences serving at the facility.

“I used to help to deliver babies, even my own grandchildren were born at this clinic,” beamed Brodie. “Whatever we could not manage were sent to Cornwall Regional Hospital.”

She shared that before her retirement in 1996, she had worked with other medical staff at the facility for 23 years.

Brodie said she was loved by the community and residents would enquire when she was coming back to work when she went off on vacation, simply because she treated everybody well.

“It’s good news, hearing that plans are now in place to reopen the clinic. It was a good clinic and if it reopens, I would be very happy. I wouldn’t mind if I can get it now because I would not have to go to Montego Bay for the clinic,” she told The Gleaner.

Pansy McKenzie-Fenton of Hampton said her last child was born at the Hopeton Maternity Centre, but soon after she was forced to take the journey to Cornwall Regional Hospital or the Granville Health Centre to get regular medical care for herself and her children after the facility was closed.

“My last son was born there in 1995, but it was scaling down from that time as people used to break into the facility and vandalise the furniture,” McKenzie-Fenton said.

“It was a type one clinic – the best set of nurses and doctors used to work at this clinic because they used to do delivery (of babies). If you go through the record up here, you’ll see how many children were born there,” she explained.