By Christopher Lloyd Caliwan/ PNA
MANILA — The Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) announced the construction of two Mapagkalinga Centers in Tagum City and Davao City, which will house hundreds of waiting patients and watchers seeking medical treatment at Southern Philippines Medical Center (SPMC) and Davao Regional Medical Center (DRMC).
PCSO Chairman and OIC-General Manager Anselmo Simeon Pinili over the weekend said the board unanimously approved the construction of an eight-story multipurpose Mapagkalinga Center for SPMC and a five-story Mapagkalinga Center for DRMC, with a total cost of PHP268 million, after a recent meeting at the Marco Polo Hotel in Davao city and a two-day inspection and review of the building’s plan and design.
He said the proposed project will be submitted to President Rodrigo Duterte and the PCSO hopes to start the project after the election ban and finish it in one year.
Both buildings will house the PCSO Davao and Tagum Branch while the rest of the space will be allotted for transient facilities for watchers and patients, a space for children’s play area, breastfeeding section, cafeteria and each floor will have respective restrooms with shower rooms, cooking and laundry area. It will have an ample space for parking and two service elevators.
Aside from these, the building will be environment-friendly as it will have a rainwater catchment facility, sewerage treatment plant, solar panels and material recovery facility.
The PCSO Mapagkalinga Center aims to serve as platform for care giving trainings, women’s skills and livelihood seminars and empowerment activities.
It also aims to complement and serve as add-on to PhilHealth’s individual-based services and DOH’s population-based services under the recently passed Universal Health Care for All Filipinos Act.
Pinili said about 650 walk-in patients are being attended to daily at the Emergency and Trauma Rooms of SPMC, the largest government hospital in the Philippines and 400 more at DRMC. More than half of these patients come from the different provinces in Mindanao as far as Bukidnon and they are just waiting outside the hospital.
“The impression of people on government hospitals is that it is dirty and inefficient so we wanted to mediate and through a little help from PCSO we will changed the impression of people on government hospitals,” Pinili said.
A typical patient seeking medical attention get to spend at least three days at the hospital for checkup and follow-up, while patients undergoing chemotherapy and other serious illnesses spend more days and they would rather stay uncomfortably in the hospital rather than spend on their fare to the province only to return the next day to check on their loved ones.
Then Davao City mayor and now President Rodrigo Duterte has provided Balay Pahulayan, a temporary shelter to waiting patients and watchers. However, this facility is not enough as the number of patients going to the two hospitals have already tripled in numbers.
Atty. Gay Alvor, chairperson of Gender and Development Focal Point System (GAD-FPS), explained that Mapagkalinga Center Project will be piloted in Mindanao because it is the least serviced area of the agency’s hospitalization assistance program.
He added that the DRMC and SPMC were selected as pilot beneficiaries of the project due to their strategic role as Mindanao’s leading government tertiary hospital.
DRMC and SPMC have expressed willingness to provide the necessary areas for the PCSO Mapagkalinga Center.
PCSO Director Sandra Cam, who spearheaded the distribution of t-shirts for the out patients and watchers during the hospital visit, said that it’s high time that the government focuses on providing a healing environment for patient and their watchers.
Cam described the project as a “smart investment” because it will make the hospital stay less stressful for patients as well as their watchers.
“‘Yung nagbabantay sa pasyente pagkatapos mag-alaga sa ospital, baka sila naman ang magsakit dahil na-exposed sila sa stress, walang matulugan ng maayos, hindi makaligo. Lalo yung mga kababaihan, bata at PWDs natin. Dagdag gastos pa ito sa pamilya kaya ito ang ating tutugunan (The ones who care for the patients, they might get sick because of stress and lack of sleep. They cannot even take a bath. Women especially, children, and PWDs it might add to the burden of the families so we will take care of that),” Cam said.
