New health centres to be built
THE AUXILIARY medical centre in Cox is to be extended to make room for new consultation areas and Algorfa town hall is preparing to cede land for the construction of a health centre.
Regional health councillor Ana Barceló visited both municipalities and explained the plans for the centre in Cox.
The building is set to be extended by 350 sqm with an estimated budget of €648,000 and the project is scheduled to take three months to draw up. The centre covers a population of 7,200 people and has four family doctors, two paediatricians, three nurses, a midwife, a physiotherapist, an auxiliary nurse in rehabilitation and two administrative assistants.
The redesign will provide a reception area and a family medicine area with four doctor’s offices and two for nursing, while paediatrics will move to the new area and make room for the midwife.
The rehabilitation area, which is currently located in a town hall building, will move into the new extension with an office for appointments and a gym with changing rooms. There will also be an office for extractions and emergencies and one for nursing, waiting rooms, a meeting room, etc.
Moving on to Algorfa, Sra Barceló said the procedure to build a new health centre is underway, with funding assigned in the 2019 regional budget and a suitable plot of municipal land has been found.
Mayor Manuel Ros said it is needed to resolve the lack of space which patients and medical workers have to put up with at the moment. The current situation is ‘unsustainable’ because ‘several doctors have to share an office and there is not enough space for a doctor and a paediatrician’. The existing medical centre is relatively new but there is no way of extending it or providing parking spaces, the mayor explained.
“Because it is in the town centre there are certain architectural barriers which are impossible to resolve,” he said.
The new centre will be located just five minutes away and will have a car park.
Sr Ros said the town hall has already started the procedure to officially cede the land to the regional health department, which will then be able to start drawing up the project.