Lead the way, young health workers urged

SITEKI - Government has challenged the young upcoming healthcare workers to lead the way in introducing innovative approach in the health sector.

The Minister of Health, Lizzy Nkosi, who was represented by the Director of Health Services Dr Velephi Okello during the Good Shepherd Catholic College of Health Services’ 49th graduation ceremony, said the health sector was faced with multiple challenges that require new strategies, efficiency in the use of resources and increased adoption of innovative approaches such as artificial intelligence. She said provision of healthcare services in Eswatini was in the process of rapidly adapting to the changing environment, in order to satisfy the needs of the population. She said they were living at a time that was different from what they saw 20 years ago and the expectations from patients or clients had also changed with the times.

The minister said there would come a time in the future when a patient would frown upon healthcare workers if they take their history and write it on paper. She said it would become a norm to record patient information on an electronic gadget.

She said they had just witnessed the new buildings which were being constructed at the Good Shepherd Catholic Hospital and added that as a ministry, they had long realised that the hospital Outpatient Department had limited space for patient consultation rooms and patient waiting rooms. She said currently, one consultation room was shared by two doctors and their patients. Therefore, she said with the availability of funds and through Micro-Projects, the ministry and the hospital had initiated the construction of a three-storey building, which would accommodate 10 outpatient consultation rooms at the ground floor, a laboratory, an x-ray and ultrasonography unit in the first floor and offices on the third floor.