Unsatisfactory! Hospitals and health centres fall below required standards

Tyrone Reid, Sunday Gleaner Reporter

Dozens of state-owned hospitals and health centres are failing to meet the required standards of the Kingston and St Andrew (KSA) Public Health Department.

Public health inspectors who scrutinise the excreta disposal facilities, the water supply and solid waste management among a string of other areas of public health and safety concerns have given a failing grade to more than a dozen hospitals and no less than 23 clinics since 2008.

Official statistics provided by the Corporate Area-based public health watchdog agency showed that none of the 13 hospitals and 13 health centres in Kingston and St Andrew inspected in 2008 and 2009 was given its stamp of public health approval. The data for 2010 was not immediately available.

In 2008, 13 hospitals were inspected 49 times and all of the facilities were deemed unsatisfactory. The following year, the public health inspectors carried out 180 inspections on the 13 hospitals. Again, none of the hospitals - including the Kingston Public Hospital (KPH), was given a "satisfactory" grade.

Public health inspectors also carried out 15 inspections in 2008 and 33 inspections in 2009 on the 13 health centres used by mostly poor Jamaicans who cannot afford private health-care, and all of them were adjudged to be in an unsatisfactory public health condition.

Additional information provided by Everton Baker, acting chief public health inspector at the KSA Public Health Department revealed that the poor public health track record of the hospitals in the Kingston and St Andrew region continues.

According to Baker, 11 hospitals have been inspected since January this year and so far none of them has been given a satisfactory public health grade.

On the other hand, the health centres have shown some improvement. Of the 26 health centres inspected so far this year, 16 of them were stamped satisfactory.

According to Baker there are about 13 hospitals and 33 health centres spread across the twin parish municipality of Kingston and St Andrew.

Baker explained that the facilities are inspected with a weighted instrument known as the institutional health inspection form. An institution will be graded as being in an unsatisfactory public health condition if it fails to make the grade in any one of the critical areas outlined on the instrument.

"It is all or nothing when you are being graded," said Baker.

The acting chief public health inspector for the KSA pointed out that the absence of overcrowding at these facilities was a critical component, as well as, adequacy and potability of the water supply.

Although the hospitals and health centres have been flunking the public health inspections, Baker said that does not mean they are in a state of utter squalor. "They are not yet at the point where they need to be closed," he said.

Efforts to get a comment from the South East Regional Health Authority late on Friday were unsuccessful.

However, after being quizzed by our news team, Baker disclosed that the management teams of the various institutions are made aware of the results of the inspections.

"A summary work plan is served on the operators to correct the breaches," he said.

Food section ordered close

A source told The Sunday Gleaner that the food section of one hospital was ordered close five years ago after a public health inspection ruled that the despicable conditions were untenable.

The data supplied by the KSA public health department showed that schools, nursing homes and day-care centres were performing better at the public health exams than the hospitals and clinics. During the period, the 600 plus schools in Kingston and St Andrew improved their satisfactory percentage from an unenviable 34 per cent in 2008 to 61 per cent in 2009.

Day-care centres jumped from 23 per cent to an impressive 70 per cent during the period under review while performance of nursing homes remained virtually unchanged with its 58 per cent satisfactory rating in 2009, which was just a percentage point less than its 2008 score.

tyrone.reid@gleanerjm.com