'Real emergencies' at Trauma Centre

Not all cases that come to Rashid Hospital’s Trauma Centre are “real emergencies”.

“In reality, 60 per cent of these cases are not real emergencies. They can go to see their GP, or an “urgent care unit”, they don’t need to be in trauma. We need to optimize services used in Trauma,’” said Dr Haidar Al Yousuf, director of health funding at the Dubai Healthcare Facility (DHA).

This confusion over what’s “real emergency” leads to delayed assistance for the right patient.

Talking exclusively to Emirates24|7, Dr Firas Annajjar at the Trauma and Emergency Centre, said, “It is better if non-urgent cases go directly to the healthcare centres, then it would enable us to take care of the big cases efficiently.”

Dr Yousuf added, “Dubai is building a lot more ‘urgent care units’ to take the load off the trauma centre.”

Patients are divided into five categories depending on the intensity of their injury or condition – T1, T2 and T3 as most cruial, with T4 and T5 marked less/non urgent.

T4 (or less urgent) cases should technically go to the “24|7 healthcare clinics of the DHA located in Al Barsha and Nadd al Hammar” and not dip into the resources available at the Trauma for more urgent medical cases.

The recent expansion of Rashid Hospital’s Trauma Centre, with an additional 159 beds, should help focus on providing immediate care to patients in “real emergencies”.

According to the DHA, the extension makes Rashid Hospital the biggest in the country with 786 new beds (66 in intensive care and 93 in general surgery).

"This is the largest and most sophisticated trauma centre in the Middle East,” said Dr Yousuf.

“Dubai is moving towards ‘healthcare model innovation’, we want to make sure patients are treated in the right place, at the right time. Emergencies are treated as emergencies. And appropriate care reaches non-emergencies as well.”

Humaid Al Qatami, chairman of the board and director-general of DHA said the new expansion will be overseen by experienced doctors, nurses and technicians, who were chosen to ensure the satisfaction of patients.

Dr Alya Mazrouei, CEO of Rashid Hospital said new medical specializations have also been added as part of the expansion, they include hand, liver and spine surgery, bone fractures and bariatric surgery.

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