May 12, 2006

THE MINISTER OF HEALTH OF THE SULTANATE OF OMAN POINTS TO THE GCC UNIFIED PLAN TO FIGHT POTENTIAL EPIDEMICS, INCLUDING ANY OUTBREAKS RELATED TO BIRD FLU. THE OPENING OF 12 HEALTH PROJECTS IN SEVEN AREAS. TELEMEDICINE LINKS OMAN SQU'S COLLEGE OF MEDICINE & HEALTH SCIENCES WITH THE WORLD. Oman's Health Minister Dr Ali Bin Mohammed Bin Moosa said that the Ministry of Health presented the authorities concerned with a comprehensive document for the seventh health five-year plan. The document includes the objectives, the procedures and mechanisms to achieve the goal. The minister stressed that the document includes a number of health projects to be implemented across the Sultanate. These projects aim to improve quality of health services and that the ministry is awaiting the final approval of this plan, he said. The health minister explained that on the 35th National Day, 12 projects worth RO8 million will be opened. They include Quriyat Health Complex, Al Ansab Health Centre, renovation of Khoula Hospital, medical laboratories and X-ray laboratories and medical waste treatment system. In the governorate of Dhofar, Salalah Health Complex and Central Salalah Health Centre will be opened at a total cost of RO3 million. In the Dakhiliya region, Barkat Al Mooz Health Centre and Tanouf Health Centre worth RO700,000 will be opened. In the northern Batinah region, Saham Health Complex built at a cost of over RO1 million will be opened. In the Sharqiyah southern region, A'tahwoh Health Centre constructed at a cost of over RO 400,000 will be inaugurated on the National Day. In the Dhahirah region, Hamra'a A'drou Health Centre worth RO400,000 will be opened. Khasab Health Centre worth over RO1 million will be opened in the governorate of Musandam. Several health projects are being executed in the Dakhiliyah region at a cost of RO2,011,000 as part of efforts of the Ministry of Health to ensure better health care in all parts of the Sultanate. In the wilayat of Bahla, a health complex is being set up to serve indoor and outdoor patients, besides having specialised units for ENT, dental, skin and internal diseases. The complex will also have other units. In the Nyabat of Barkat Al Maouz, another health centre is being built at a cost of RO318,843. In Tanouf in the wilayat of Nizwa, a health centre is being built at a cost of RO613,338. A heath centre is being built in the wilayat of Izki to serve the people of Saima and Maqzah villages and the neighbouring areas. The Sultanate of Oman has accomplished important achievements in health over a short period of time. The international community and organizations have praised such achievements in their reports. Health indicators have shown a remarkable decline in mortality rates and an increase in life expectancy of the Omani population. These achievements are attributed to reductions made in communicable diseases. The health sector, however, still faces challenges. The most important is the epidemiological transition to non-communicable diseases related to modern life style. Health information and statistics has a crucial role in the health situation analysis and in decision-making. Ministry of Health publishes yearly national health indicators and other health statistics that describe the health system. The mission of the Ministry of Health is to enhance the health and well being of all the people of Oman by ensuring the availability of comprehensive health services throughout the Sultanate. In order to attain and sustain the highest possible level of health, MOH cooperates and collaborate with other social and economic sectors, for protecting and promoting the health of the people in their bid to achieve a better quality of life. The Ministry of Health shares with the people, the responsibility for achieving a state of health, which will permit them to lead a socially and economically productive life. The Sultanate of Oman's achievement in the health sector, in a relatively short span of three decades, have been appreciated by the people of Oman and recognized by the international community. The Ministry of Health, through its five-year health development plans, is further improving its health care infrastructure, creating new institution and new programmes to fulfill the unmet needs and to meet new threats from emerging health problems. Since 1970 the Sultanate of Oman has made great strides in developing its health services, leading to striking improvements in the country's public health. The quality of Oman's health care has been praised by international organizations such as the World Health Organization, UNICEF and the United Nations Development Fund. In 1970 the government was responsible for providing most of the country's health services, and for the next ten years was solely responsible for the populations' basic health care. At present the government operates hospitals, and referral hospitals. The referral hospitals are equipped to provide high quality specialized outpatient and inpatient services in such areas as internal diseases, surgery, paediatrics, gynaecology and obstetrics, orthopaedics, eye, ear, nose and throat (ENT) diseases, dermatology and oral health. They also have disease and tissue diagnostics clinics, laboratories and radiography departments. In addition, most health regions have wilayat and local hospitals providing patients with some specialist secondary health care services. The hospitals still provide primary health care services through the specialist outpatient clinics. The rise in the number of outpatients and inpatients was paralleled by an increase in laboratory, radiography and dentistry services. Before 1970 there were fewer than a hundred people employed in the health sector and only 13 doctors, there were no state hospitals except for a small number of health centres containing a maximum capacity of 12 beds. Preventative medicine was non-existent, and diseases were spread rapidly due to contaminated water supplies and lack of sewerage systems. Times have changed rapidly over the last 30 years, and reports by the United Nations have declared Oman as being amongst the world's leading countries in preventative medicine. The Health Education Department of the Ministry of Health frequently launches extensive campaigns concerning the likes of breast-feeding, family spacing, anti-smoking and healthy eating. In addition, a National Health Programmes Bureau has been established to supervise three major projects: the Expanded Vaccinations Programme; the Tuberculosis Prevention Programme; and the Blindness Prevention Programme. The Ministry of Health has also worked in conjunction with other Ministries to set up a number of specialist committees such as: the Drinking Water Committee; the Environmental Health Committee; the National Committee for the Prevention of Malaria; and the National Authority for the Health of Woman and Child. Serving the Sultanate of Oman, the 524-bed Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) Hospital in Muscat offers extremely high standards of clinical care and teaching expertise. Supported by advanced laboratories and diagnostic equipment, the government-owned hospital includes many specialist facilities that are unique to Oman, including renal and bone marrow transplant units. Academic and patient care functions are coordinated with other hospitals in the Sultanate. To provide more flexible, student centred training the university has made a significant investment in videoconferencing-based telemedicine. This strategy has allowed SQU to develop a 'hybrid' teaching model that can accommodate the demands of increasing student numbers. Blending the benefits of on-line teaching with traditional face-to-face methods, the university's telemedicine solution centres around a videoconferencing system. The system allows live video images and audio to be transmitted to plasma and LCD screens over a broadband fibre optic network linking the College of Medicine & Health Sciences with the rest of the University Hospital campus. Remotely controllable CCD colour video cameras in six operating theatres are used to capture images from surgical procedures. As well as being displayed live on plasma and LCD monitors around the campus, images are also recorded onto DVCAM tape in an adjacent control room for subsequent review and training. Content can be edited using a non-linear editing system and 'burned' onto disc for distribution to students. The system is also used for videoconferencing over ISDN links with other hospitals and teaching centres in India, UAE and the United States. Linking the university's College of Medicine & Health Sciences with the hospital allows SQU to offer high-quality instruction to large groups of medical students without crowding operating theatres. As well as being able to converse with the surgeon via a live audio & video link during operations, students can review past operations on DVD. The videoconferencing system allows connection between sites within the university, including links between surgery and clinical physiology departments and an annex building. The system also connects the university's ophthalmology department with another specialist centre at the Sankara Nethralya Hospital in India. The same system has been used to 'broadcast' live proceedings from a medical conference in United Arab Emirates to SQU students, with video signals being transmitted from UAE to Oman via ISDN. It has also been employed as a consultation tool with Texas Children's Cancer Centre in Houston, USA. The Sultanate joined the international community in celebrating the World Health Day held under the theme 'Working Together for Health' which focused on difficulties overwhelming health workers worldwide. The Ministry of Health marked the occasion with a ceremony under the auspices of Shaikh Hilal bin Khalid al Maawali, Minister of Civil Service, in addition to other functions in various governorates and wilayats of the Sultanate. Dr Ali bin Mohammed bin Moosa, Minister of Health, said in a statement that the World Health Day observed on April 7 was aimed at creating public awareness on health concerns. The minister said that this year's theme addressed a crisis faced by health systems all over the world, particularly in developing countries, in the area of health workforce. The minister warned that this problem was so acute that it should be tackled rapidly through proper measures, otherwise it would adversely affect the achievements in health development, probably resulting in a severe setback. In reply to a question about the health workforce in the country, the minister said there were three areas of concern in the world, especially in developing nations scarce investment in health education and training and the ensuing chronic shortage in numbers of health workers and the extremely tough nature and conditions of health work as well as difficulty to keep health workers in job amid high international competitiveness over their services. Dr Moosa said the population growth in developing countries, including the Sultanate, and the continuous shift in the pandemic chart, in addition to emergence of new disease patterns, underscored the need for increasing the number of highly trained and skilled medical and health cadres. He pointed out that the Seventh Five-Year Plan would provide health requirements to the extent the financial resources would permit. The resources, the minister added, would be distributed to achieve the maximum balanced health development in all regions. A ceremony marking World Health Day was held under the auspices of Shaikh Hilal bin Khalid al Maawali, Minister of Civil Service. It was attended by Dr Ali bin Mohammed bin Moosa, Minister of Health, and a number of ministers and senior officials and personnel of the health sector. Al Maawali thanked the personnel working in the medical field for doing their best in providing the best possible health service to the public. He also expressed pride about the progress achieved in the Sultanate in all spheres, including the health sector, thanks to the wise directives of Sultan Qaboos. Dr Ali bin Mohammed said that the World Health Day provides an opportunity for governments and decision-makers to plan better for the development of human resources in the health field. The minister pointed out that the population growth and the change of the demographical map necessitates the increase of medical workers. He noted that the shortage of doctors, nurses and medical assistants worldwide today is estimated at 4,000,000 jobs, of which more than 300,000 jobs lie vacant in the Middle East region. The minister said that the government invested much in the training of doctors and other health workers over the past 15 years during which more than 7,000 jobs were Omanised. He added that more is required to 'nationalise' knowledge, noting that Oman has a better chance to improve the quality of human resources development. On the other hand the Ministry of Health is looking at introducing a system whereby private doctors and healthcare staff will be granted a 're-licence' if they invest a certain number of hours in upgrading their relevant medical knowledge and skills. The objective, according to a senior Ministry official, is to encourage private healthcare workers to keep abreast of the latest developments in their respective areas of expertise by attending workshops and continuous medical education (CME) programmes. "The idea is to have a good quality of private healthcare services," said Dr Ali bin Jaffar Mohammed, Health Affairs Adviser at the Ministry of Health. "We need doctors to read about new things, be aware of new developments, and practice medicine that is evidence based." The issue figured in a speech by Dr Ali at the inauguration of the 19th Annual Workshop of Private Health Establishments, at the Crowne Plaza yesterday. Around 300 healthcare personnel from the private sector attended the daylong workshop, which was organised by the Health Ministry's Directorate of Private Health Establishment Affairs. Dr Ali stressed, however, that the Ministry was still some time away from implementing the proposal. "We are working on it, and will work on it probably over the next two or three years. We will not be launching it, say, in 2006 or 2007, but ultimately we will have it," he added in comments to the Observer. He said the Ministry was looking at introducing a system of 'credit hours' corresponding to the amount of time spent in training or as a participant in a workshop or a continuous medical education (CME) programme. Thus, a doctor or paramedic can accumulate 'credit hours' for the time spent in training in Oman, the Gulf states, or at an accredited centre anywhere in the world. "Even when you're on leave, say, for two months, and you spend five six days in a good workshop, you can obtain credit hours from your home country," the official added. Earlier, Dr Ali stressed the government's commitment to supporting the growth of the private healthcare sector in Oman. Substantial amounts in loans have been allocated by Oman Development Bank in helping private investors establish hospitals, polyclinics and other healthcare facilities, he said. "The Ministry of Health promotes private health establishments through a number of initiatives, notably through referrals of certain categories to private clinics, and allowing senior level government doctors to work part-time in private health establishments," he said. Turning to other issues, the Adviser also urged the private healthcare sector to play a full part in the implementation of national healthcare programmes. Thus, initiatives such as ear and thyroid screening in children, which is routinely carried in Ministry and public hospitals, must also be offered to patients visiting private clinics. Likewise, the frequency of maternity checks for pregnant women visiting private clinics must match that applicable to public hospitals, he stressed. The official also urged compliance with immunisation criteria set out under the Ministry's Epidemiological Programme of Immunisation (EPI). Thus, if the EPI programme stipulates two doses for Mumps-Measles-Rubella (MMR) immunisation, this requirement must be heeded, regardless of what the doctor believes is the practice in his hometown, he declared. Dr Ali also called upon the private sector to work with the Ministry in its plan to eliminate tuberculosis (TB). Cases of TB patients turning at private clinics must be duly notified to the authorities, he said. "We are partners in providing healthcare services to the people," the official said, adding that the private sector had grown significantly in recent years. Meanwhile Dr Ali Bin Mohammed Bin Moosa, Health Minister, emphasised that the Sultanate had its own Vision 2020 plan for the elimination of avoidable blindness. It was formulated in 1999. The sixth and the seventh Five-Year Health Plans have incorporated the activities of this Vision 2020 plan, he said. He stressed that since the Renaissance and under the auspices of Sultan Qaboos Bin Said, the government has stressed improving health care and has provided Omani citizens and residents with a high quality health services. Eye care services are now available in all regions, he added. Blindness due to malnutrition and infectious eye diseases are declining, he said. Improved socioeconomic condition, access to free health services and dedication of health staff are mainly responsible for these changes. He pointed out that trachoma, which was a major cause of blindness in the 1970s, is now no more a public health problem and there will be no blindness due to trachoma by 2010. At present, 28 Ministry of Health institutions offer state-of-the-art eye care in all the 10 health regions of Oman. The Ophthalmic Department of Al Nahdha Hospital has different subspecialties of eye to provide special care. Few cases, therefore, are now sent to other countries for treatment, the health minister explained. Oman has not reported blindness due to vitamin A deficiency in last two decades. Immunisation against rubella and measles had reduced the risk of childhood blindness and screening for refractive error, diabetic retinopathy and glaucoma had been introduced, he said. Of late, assessment and care for children with special needs had been initiated in all regions through collaborative efforts of other ministries, he said. "We are also perusing the national goals of building capacity of Omani manpower in the field of eye care. At present, nearly 20 qualified Omani ophthalmologists offer services in different subspecialties," he added. However, improved health services and life expectancy of the Omani population have resulted in the rise of age-related eye diseases, like cataract, glaucoma and eye complications of metabolic diseases like diabetes. "Blindness due to these conditions could be avoided or delayed by prompt detection and proper eye care. We have ensured in our future health planning to strengthen our services to deal with them," he said. The contribution of the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Social Development, especially in advocacy and rehabilitative of visually impaired, is substantial. The medical sector is rapidly evolving due to technological inventions. Hence, the role of private clinics and hospital in providing modern care is very crucial, he said, adding: "We acknowledge their contribution in our efforts of providing state-of-the-art eye care." Thus service providers are committed to offering eye care. "But such a marathon task is not possible to achieve alone. We need all interested parties to join hands in this task. The community also should participate. It should be made aware about the common mission." At the end of his speech, the health minister thanked Al Noor Association for the Blind, and other organisations in Muscat and many other regions, which will be conducting a number of events to mark this day. Studies indicate that blindness rates came down from 3 per cent in the 1980s to 2 per cent in the 1990s and to 1.1 per cent between 1996-1997. Global data on visual impairment suggested that there are 37 million blind people and 124 million with low vision worldwide. Every five seconds, one person in our world goes blind and a child goes blind every minute. Every year, an additional one to two million people become blind. Seventy-five per cent of these cases are treatable and/or preventable; 90,0l0 of the blind belong to the poorest section of the developing world. Without proper interventions, the number of blind will increase to 75 million by 2020. Restoration of sight is one of the most cost-effective interventions in health care. In view of these facts, the member countries adopted a global resolution in 1999 to join hands and deal with this issue. This initiative is called 'Vision 2020 the Right to the Sight'. On the other hand GCC Health Ministers have agreed to form a unified Gulf plan to fight potential epidemics, including any outbreaks related to bird flu. The ministers, decided to form a regional committee to follow up the issue of bird flu, The Omani Minister of Health said. They agreed to hold regular assessments of the performance of all regional health bodies related to the issue and invest in whatever facilities needed modernising. They also agreed to take advantage of a United Nations (UN) health network set up specifically for bird flu and to continuously update the strategies in place in each country to fight the epidemic. They agreed to hold joint training programmes related to epidemic diseases in Saudi Arabia for officials from all GCC health ministries and to continue to meet to exchange information and expertise. The GCC health officials will also be instructed to look at what happened in other countries with regards to this issue and follow up a previous plan to establish a regional centre to fight diseases. Ministers also discussed a plan to establish a regional nursing council with a timetable to be prepared by the GCC Council of Health Ministries General Secretariat in May. They also agreed on a four-year plan to develop nursing services in the region. With regards to primary health care, the ministers decided that a report should be made by the General Secretariat on the situation in each country to be discussed at a future meeting. They said that all health centres should be modernised and beefed up to become each country's first line of defence against non-contagious diseases. They also agreed to set up a regional committee consisting of health ministry under-secretaries, which would meet next May in Geneva to discuss a plan to make the Arabian Peninsula completely free of malaria. They also decided that the ministries should work together to maintain a polio vaccination rate that covers no less than 95 per cent of the population of the region. The ministers decided to enact a previously agreed plan to promote health awareness, including a regional campaign under the theme 'Your Safety'. A region-wide survey of the population's health will also take place this year, covering all six GCC countries.