A TOTAL of seven health facilities in Central Luzon have applied to be coronavirus disease (Covid-19) testing centers.
These include Jose B. Lingad Memorial General Hospital (JBLMGH), The Medical City Clark, Rafael Lazatin Memorial Medical Center also known as Ospital Ning Angeles, Green City Medical Center, Central Luzon Doctors’ Hospital, Tarlac Provincial Hospital, and Bataan General Hospital and Medical Center.
In a regional virtual press briefing Monday, Department of Health (DOH) Local Health Support Division chief Lailani Mangulabnan revealed that JBLMGH is the only hospital in the sole applicant that has progressed to stage three of the process. The six others are still on stage one.
“JBLMGH is at stage three of the laboratory accreditation wherein hospital personnel will undergo training before the conduct of mass testing. The personnel will be trained by the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine that will take about three days. Then, the fourth stage is proficiency testing, and the fifth and final stage is the full-scale implementation. The laboratory in the hospital will then be certified and allowed to process and test samples,” Mangulabnan said.
Relative to this, JBLMGH Medical Center Chief Monserrat Chichioco discussed their measures to accommodate the possible influx of Covid-19 patients in the hospital.
“We have converted some of our wards into Covid-19 dedicated wards and as of now, we have 119 beds. But we are still converting another ward for us to have another Intensive Care Unit (ICU). Because our ICU dedicated to Covid-19 is accommodating to only 20 critical care patients,” Chichioco said during the press briefing.
She also assured the public that they continue to serve non-Covid patients amid closure of nearby medical institutions.
“We are smoothly running the facility in regards to the Covid-19 but we did not close our usual or regular services to patients since some hospitals have limited their services. So even though we have Covid-19 patients, we continue our services for 400 admitted patients which consists of various cases such as pediatrics, OB-gynecology, surgical and orthopedic,” she said.
As of April 18, DOH reported a total of 304 confirmed Covid-19 cases including 46 recoveries and 32 fatalities in Central Luzon. (PIA-Central Luzon)