Observe hospital protocols in Covid-19 patient care: experts

MANILA – Visiting Israeli health experts shared key methods that the Department of Health (DOH) should consider in treating Covid-19 patients.

Dr. Guy Choshen, infectious diseases and Covid-19 specialist, said among the steps are the implementation of standard health care in DOH medical centers, communication of patient discharge guidelines, and protocols on patient visitations in hospitals.

DOH should also consider the imposition of critical patients’ restrictions and infection control measures, he added.

The team of Israeli experts went to hospitals and medical facilities within Metro Manila during their five-day stay to observe operations.

Choshen lauded health care workers for relentlessly serving amid the pandemic.

“I was highly impressed by their professionalism and I am sure that there are better ways to improve the way you give health care to the cities,” he said during an exit conference at the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council office in Quezon City on Friday.

Chaim Markos Rafalowski, a disaster management coordinator at Israel’s national blood and medical emergency service Magen David Adom, said their government conducts a national daily evaluation involving over 100 health care professionals to discuss the health care system.

“The objective of this is to understand the current situation and to identify the crisis and try to foresee where we are heading,” he said. “And the most important aspect is to set up priorities for immediate action for the short and long-term health care system with regards to Covid-19.”

DOH Secretary Francisco Duque III said the government has a unified strategy to reduce the country’s fatality rate due to Covid-19.

“One of the impacts that we hope to be able to achieve in our unified strategy management against this pandemic is to bring down mortality rate, perhaps to less than 1 percent, if not less than .5 percent, as much as we can,” he said.

National Task Force Against Covid-19 Chief Implementer Secretary Carlito Galvez Jr. said the health recommendations of the Israeli delegates are a huge contribution to scaling up the country’s policy direction.

“Our countries may have similar approaches and practices in managing the pandemic. But this weeklong exchange of learnings has made us realize that there is much to be done. Our meetings have also opened a lot of possibilities which our Covid-19 task force can explore in terms of policy direction,” Galvez said in his message read by Deputy Presidential Peace Adviser Undersecretary Isidro Purisima.