Get GPs to monitor home-quarantined Covid-19 patients, MMA tells Sarawak

 

A frontliner at work at a Labuan waterfront village where many were home quarantined. The MMA says GPs should be roped in to oversee home quarantine patients. (Bernama pic)

PETALING JAYA: The Malaysian Medical Association (MMA) said the work of managing and monitoring Covid-19 patients in Sarawak undergoing quarantine in their homes can be outsourced to general practitioners (GPs).

Its president Dr Koh Kar Chai, in concurring with Sarawak United Peoples Party (SUPP) women’s chief Kho Teck Wan’s suggestion, said this practice had been implemented in Klang Valley and several other states.

He pointed out there were 244 GP clinics in the Bornean state.

“We are surprised as to why it isn’t being implemented in Sarawak, especially now when cases have risen exponentially in the state,” Koh said in a statement.

Kho made the suggestion to the state health department and the Sarawak disaster management committee (SDMC) earlier this week, urging them to outsource the job of the Covid Assessment Centre (CAC) to GPs.

She said this would allow more government doctors to focus on treating patients who were critically ill in hospitals.

Koh also said the high number of cases in Sarawak would pose difficulties for government health officers working in CAC to handle home quarantine patients.

He said that on Sept 12, it was reported that there were close to 30,000 category 1 and 2 patients on home quarantine in Sarawak.

“SDMC should consider the suggestion to prevent late admissions of severe Covid-19 and brought in dead (BID) cases,” he added. - FMT