Ministry to discuss with S’wak govt to establish Socso rehab centre

KUCHING: The Human Resources Ministry will discuss with the Sarawak government on the establishment of a Social Security Organisation (Socso) Rehabilitation Centre in the state, the Dewan Rakyat was told yesterday.

Minister Steven Sim said his ministry is indeed planning to add three more rehabilitation centres throughout the country in the next five years.

“Sarawak is one of the regions that are welcomed to cooperate in realising this plan.

“The ministry is ready to hold further discussions regarding the location, current needs and cooperation with the Sarawak government, since the development of this rehabilitation centre involves a large cost,” he said during Question Time yesterday.

Sim was replying to a question from Dato Sri Richard Riot Jaem (GPS-Serian) regarding plans by the ministry to establish and build a Socso Rehabilitation Centre in Sarawak to facilitate patients who need to undergo rehabilitation treatment.

Sim said Socso currently has one such centre in Melaka that has been operating since 2014, while an upcoming rehabilitation centre in Ipoh, Perak is in the development phase.

Another proposed centre in Terengganu is now in the design planning phase, he informed.

For Sarawak, Sim said Socso at the moment has an understanding with Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (Unimas) to provide rehabilitation programmes at the Unimas Teaching Hospital since 2022.

He revealed that among the facilities provided at Unimas are consultation by a rehabilitation physician, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, neurological rehabilitation, neurological rehabilitation with neuromodulation therapy, speech and language communication assessment, speech therapy, cardio respiratory rehabilitation, sleep study, neuro-robotics, and cybernics rehabilitation programme.

Based on Socso statistics, he said a total of 18 cases have been referred to Unimas from August 2022 until Jan 31, 2024.