Cornwall Regional Hospital curtails outpatient services

 

Cornwall Regional Hospital in St. James has curtailed outpatient services due to a shortage of medical supplies. 

 

Dr. Delroy Fray, Clinical Coordinator at the Western Regional Health Authority, says there is a shortage of tubes used to collect blood samples.

 

"We got a supply of 3,000 tubes in for the weekend and my chief technologist told me that 'Dr. Fray, this can only last for like two to three days.' So, what we had to do was to put some plans in place in order to ensure that the emergency aspect of the service is maintained," he said Thursday in an interview on the Morning Agenda on Power 106.

 

Outpatient services are now limited to persons who require surgery and oncology care, while inpatients will be prioritized based on what blood tests are more urgently needed. 

 

 

In the South East Regional Health Authority (SERHA), Regional Director Errol Greene says hospitals have resorted to borrowing medical supplies from other health facilities to ensure operations can run smoothly. 

 

He said the shortage has not been impacting service delivery in the south east region. 

 

"As at this point, it has had very little effect negatively on our services because what we do is that we borrow from ourselves and we go on the open market and wherever we can get it, we buy it. I'm not aware of any situation that we would have had a negative outcome. We just manage the supplies that we have and communicate with our staff and our team members so that we can manage supplies that we have more efficiently," he asserted.