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Normal pregnancy cases to be handled by PHCs

On Monday, the DHA launched the second phase of the programme, which is believed to reduce the load on hospitals.

Pregnant women visiting any of the DHA primary healthcare centres (PHCs) will be categorised as low-risk and high-risk patients. High-risk patients will be referred to either Latifa or Dubai Hospital, depending on their location, for specialised gynecological care.

Patients who are classified as low-risk will continue to receive treatment at the PHCs and will be transferred to a hospital during the last stage of pregnancy unless or until they develop complications during the pregnancy. In such cases, they will be immediately transferred to the hospital, said Khalid Al Sheikh Mubarak, Deputy Director-General of the authority. The first phase of the project was implemented at Al Mankhool and Al Badaa health centre and the second phase is applicable for Safa, Umm Suqeim, Twar, Mamzar and Khawaneej health centres.

Al Shaikh Mubarak said: “The benefit of this system is that patients who need advanced care have access to it immediately and that hospitals will primarily cater to high-risk patients, whereas primary healthcare physicians specialised in gynaecology will cater to low-risk patients.”

Dr Mohammad Al Olama, CEO of Hospital Services Sector, said women will have absolute clarity from the beginning of the pregnancy about the level of care they require. Dr Ahmad bin Kalban, CEO of Primary Healthcare Sector, said: “Every woman is given an antenatal card which is also her medical record card. Details of every visit are saved on our system and are jotted down on this card.”

By the end of this year, three new primary healthcare centres: Al Barsha, Nad Al Hammar and Al Mizhar, will be aligned with this new system and by the first quarter of 2013, the rest of the centres will also implement this programme, said Dr Mohammad Naser Fargali, Acting Director of Health Affairs at the DHA.

asmaalizain@khaleejtimes.com