Qamar Rafiq
THE rapid changes in our fragmented and disturbed world are having a blunt impact on the necessity and future of the medical industry. The 21st Century has the most advanced medical technology and health informatics tools compared to any previous century. In the present century healthcare is an abstract of a plantation that cultivates practises and advancements to heal humanity in the endless battle of mankind against the unconquered regime of diagnostics, prognoses and diseases. The British health care system ranks as one of the best systems in the world which is not only recognised for premium clinical healthcare but also for its picturesque landscape to champion the values of inclusiveness, equality and cohesions in a patient-clinician social system. Everyone matters, working together and making difference are the key architectures of the British health-care economy which assembles in a fashion to treat a patient as a human not a number.
On the other hand, the grim imagery of the health-care sector in Pakistan is a flippant portrayal of a fractured vineyard. The healthcare delivery system of Pakistan is very complex, however the public and private sector come together to deliver the nation’s healthcare needs. Forlornly, the chilling winds of unsafe medical care, morbidity and mortality of patients due to adverse events, misdiagnoses, surgical complication, and slow dissemination of advanced medical research and absence of clinical governance continue to blight the entire healthcare enterprise of Pakistan. The healthcare orchard in Pakistan neither blossom flowers nor embrace a perfume to heal alienated rather it makes more people sick than it heals. As a result patients have lost their faith due to disturbing cases of clinical negligence, inaccurate diagnoses, breach of patient safeguarding and transgression of clinicians which has become a platitude in Pakistan.
In the race to develop efficient healthcare technologies, decision support systems and skilled healthcare workforce, the developed nations have engendered a range of approaches to deliver healthcare with respect, dignity and compassion. Contemporary health care enterprises place patient’s safety, confidentiality and safeguarding ahead of the curve. Though, the revolution of machine learning, precision medicine, digital technologies and reforms in the reward systems have improved the overall quality of care. At glance the clinicians are trained to also treat with words; within the clinician-patient social system, the patient is moved by the words and phrases used by the healthcare workers. The clinicians dispense not only medicines but words that influence patient health and also affect the patient more than the medicine. Lack of human compassion, socio economic disparities, cultural barriers and social taboos have predominantly infected the health care culture in Pakistan. Our conventional system lacks modern innovative led approaches to provide more reliable and affordable clinical care to our growing population. The government hospitals are not only overloaded, short staffed and poorly equipped but also deficient in capacity to comply with the international quality standards of clinical governance, safeguarding and patient safety. Similarly, the code of compassionate health-care and emotional intelligence in 21st century have transformed hospitals into care cathedrals and have landed health-care workforces on the stage of magicians to perform wonders. The true spirit of patient centred care is embedded in the compassion compass of health-care workers. Be mindful the lack of compassion is as vulgar as the lack of tears in the patient-clinician social system.
Amongst many challenges in Pakistan, the poor health-care status of women and children is the major reason of the mortality but the mental health represents an area of even greater neglect. There is a worrying shortage of skilled and qualified health-care workforce, health informatics experts and health-care economists. The health-care industry is in dire need of cash injections from the Government of Pakistan to invest in the field of research and development and also to upscale the infrastructure of nationwide health-care facilities to improve their capacity. High population growth, irregular dispersal of health professionals, untrained workforce, insufficient funding and limited capacity to research and development are upsetting encryptions of plummeting health-care industry in Pakistan. Moreover, access to health-care in Pakistan is also a foremost issue for millions of people living in rural areas and facing challenges of grinding poverty who can’t afford private care which is relatively better than government facilities. Hundreds of thousands of doctors, nurses and other health-care providers in the world go above and beyond every day for their patients, staff and community. Every extra effort they make, the extra steps they take, and the extra care they give make an immense difference to the lives of the people they touch. Nevertheless, the situation in Pakistan is very dingy. In recent years we have unleashed a persistent rift between doctors and the government which has put millions of lives at risk. The Governments have been accused by health-care workers for shifting a massive amount of resources from the sick to the well. The health-care profession is full of incredible life changing stories which orchestrate both patients and health-care workers to become one force to fight together.
Having said that, the systematic flaws leading the health infrastructure fallouts in wastage of resources, duplication of work and inability of health institutions to accept change warrants a very alarming future of health-care in Pakistan. The pertinent question in Pakistan is also do we have a workforce which is vigorous to deliver high quality patient care, qualified in their fields, and above all are they passionate about being a part of the medical profession to bring difference to their patients’ lives. The Government of Pakistan must take prompt initiatives to address the loopholes in the national health policy to prioritise the framework of quality and professional standards through establishing an independent National Clinical Commissioning Group to formulate the mechanism of clinical audits, to ensure clinicians are licenced to practise, to regulate the quality standards and focus on effective and efficient planning to the preventative approaches.
Similarly, leading health-care providers and public health entities in Pakistan must also blend to emerge as intelligent health-care enterprises to provide best care solutions which can play a dynamic role for the up scaling of health-care paradigm in Pakistan. My heart is a restless garden with varying pulses, like an injured bird wishing to fly against strong winds to drop a seed in my country’s health-care vineyard from a foreign land experience, sprouting to strive in the looming tornados of health-care demand. I hope a new harvests fragrance will bloom the orchard reviving to life, out-casting tiredness to heal, pausing our fears and symphony to clams’ anxieties. Sleep, my love, another garden awaits for us.
—The writer is a Health Informatics, based in UK.
