Senator Christopher Lawrence "Bong" Go continues to push for initiatives and legislative measures that aim to strengthen the delivery of public healthcare services, especially in far-flung areas across the country, as he joined the groundbreaking of the Super Health Center in Barangay Esmeralda in Balungao, Pangasinan recently.
The senator underscored the importance of enhancing the quality of the country's healthcare system to ensure that poor Filipinos have access to medical services that they need. For this reason, Go pushed for the creation of Super Health Centers throughout the country.
The Super Health Center is a medium version of a polyclinic yet an improved version of the rural health unit. The services available in the center include database management, out-patient, birthing, isolation, diagnostic services such as laboratory: x-ray and ultrasound, pharmacy and ambulatory surgical unit.
Other available services are eye, ear, nose and throat service; oncology centers; physical therapy and rehabilitation center; and telemedicine, where remote diagnosis and treatment of patients will be done.
Go previously remarked that the government currently has nearly P3.6 billion available funds in the 2022 Health Facilities Enhancement Program to construct 305 Super Health Centers in the Philippines.
Recently, the Department of Health likewise made a statement that the establishment of Super Health Centers is intended to help reduce the rate of hospital occupancy.
"These Super Health Centers have equipment that can be found in hospitals so that we can unload hospitals. We have started these Super Health Centers where basic tests that are often needed to be conducted in hospitals can be done here, without the need for people to go to higher level facilities," said DoH Undersecretary Maria Rosario Vergeire in a previous briefing.
Vergeire likewise reassured the public that these centers are equipped to attend to the basic medical needs of Filipinos, urging them to make use of these Super Health Centers instead of going straight to hospitals as walk-in patients.
For Pangasinan, Go likewise highlighted the construction of eight more Super Health Centers in the province, including those in Alaminos City and in the towns of Basista, Manaoag, Mapandan, Tayug, Porrozubio, Asingan and Umingan.
