NST Letter: Healthcare services: Don't give us the runaround

Healthcare services: Don't give us the runaround

2011/03/16
E.F., Seremban, Negri Sembilan
letters@nst.com.my

 

I AM a retired civil servant who is well over 70 years old. After a prolonged illness and hospital stay, I am now required to go for follow-up medical examinations twice a year at Seremban Hospital.

I also need to go to a separate site, also twice a year, in order to get my medical prescriptions for my ailments.

The doctors will examine me and prescribe the medication.

The odd thing is, the doctors are always different, and always ask me to give them my medical history from A to Z.

It is becoming very tiring and frustrating at my age.

What on earth are the records for? Are the doctors too busy to read them?

The last visit was just horrible. The doctor prescribed a medication but when I went to the hospital's pharmacy to collect it, they informed me that the hospital did not even issue that medication due to the cost.

Why then did the doctor (a specialist) inform me to get it? Does he think a man in his 70s has nothing better to do then go through this runaround?

It isn't easy for senior citizens to find a way to get to the hospital just to collect their medication.

So why are they making it so difficult?

It's even worse when doctors insist on trying out medications that have not worked before because they cannot issue the ones that do, and which are sold by private hospitals.

Are we guinea pigs?

Or are the health authorities saying that retired civil servants do not deserve medication that is more expensive and should do with generic drugs?

Read more: Healthcare services: Don't give us the runaround http://www.nst.com.my/nst/articles/20olda/Article/#ixzz1GmOGB66a