Staff at COVID-19 hospital are doing a tremendous job – Health Minister

Minister of Health Dr. Frank Anthony, MP, said the staff of the Infectious Diseases Hospital at Liliendaal have been doing a tremendous job in providing the best health care services to persons affected by the Coronavirus (COVID-19).

During Tuesday’s COVID-19 update, Dr. Anthony said there are different levels of staff available to patients, including nurses and doctors, and physical therapists for those recovering.

“We have a full complement of staff, both for nurses and doctors. I think we have at the facility more than 55 doctors that work there, and they care for approximately 120 patients on average.”

There are even therapists who work with patients who are recovering from the respiratory illness.

“We do have physical therapy staff to work with those people who are recovering, so there are different levels of staff for different categories of people. And I think they have been doing a tremendous job because a lot of the persons who come to that facility are really sick, and especially those that require ICU care.”

The health ministry has assigned staff to contact relatives of patients at the facility. He said when a patient arrives at the hospital, the staff makes a record of that patient’s “preferred contact” so they could be updated.

“One of the complaints that we’ve been getting is that people, when they try to make contact with … relatives, they sometimes don’t get through. We have assigned a staff to reach out to the relatives of the patients who are there,” Minister Anthony said.

He added that health workers are unable to contact more than one family member for one patient due to the number of patients at the institution. Dr. Anthony said he hopes the public can understand the situation.

To date, 164 persons are hospitalised across the country with COVID-19. Of this number, 84 persons are currently at the Ocean View facility, with 30 patients in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU).

Dr. Anthony said the remaining cases are being treated at other regional hospitals including Port Kaituma, Suddie, West Demerara, Experiment – A facility managed by the Mahaicony hospital, New Amsterdam, Bartica, Mahdia and Wismar.