Zamboanga City - The Zamboanga City Medical Center (ZCMC) is ready for any dengue fever outbreak in the city or the region.
The ZCMC is the biggest government hospital in the Zamboanga Peninsula that started as a general hospital, along with the Philippine General Hospital and similar general hospitals in the country, during the early American regime.
Hospital spokesman Dr. Junjie Rivera said the ZCMC has established a so called dengue fever protocol to screen out dengue fever patients seeking confinement at the hospital. it calls that only those in serious stages of the diseases will be confined while allowing home treatment of non-serious patients.
Although the Department of Health (DOH) regional office has reported a total of 1,320 cases and 19 deaths for dengue fever since early this year, the medical center has confined only an average of 50 to 60 of these patients for intensive treatment of the disease.
With this number of cases and 19 deaths for the first seven months of the year, the Philippine Red Cross (PRC) has warned that it may not have enough blood platelets that patients already in serious stage.
PRC director for Zamboanga Victor Liozo said that blood platelets processed from donated blood can be kept in storage for only four days. Thus even if there is enough blood supply, the processing of platelets may not catch up with the need in case of a dengue epidemic.
On the other hand, the regional health office said that it cannot declare if the reported number of dengue cases in Zamboanga can be called an outbreak or an epidemic.
DOH Regional Director Dr. Aristides Tan said that “per data, Zamboanga City is presently ‘above alert threshold’ but has not reached the epidemic threshold.”
He also said that it is only City Mayor Celso Lobregat and City Health Officer Rodel Agbulos, who can declare an outbreak or an epidemic because this function has already been devolved to local government units based on the Local Government Code of 1991.
He said that the DOH will only get in if the mayor and the city health officer declared an outbreak.
The DOH will help in the containment and control of the disease during outbreak however the local government unit will still be in the frontline, he said.
Before an outbreak can be declared statistics must be checked depending on the number of victims. The first level is the average, alert and outbreak while the higher level is that of an epidemic.
The City Health Office is waiting for the August figures if it will record more than 277 cases, then an outbreak will declared. (PNA/PIA9-BST)
The ZCMC is the biggest government hospital in the Zamboanga Peninsula that started as a general hospital, along with the Philippine General Hospital and similar general hospitals in the country, during the early American regime.
Hospital spokesman Dr. Junjie Rivera said the ZCMC has established a so called dengue fever protocol to screen out dengue fever patients seeking confinement at the hospital. it calls that only those in serious stages of the diseases will be confined while allowing home treatment of non-serious patients.
Although the Department of Health (DOH) regional office has reported a total of 1,320 cases and 19 deaths for dengue fever since early this year, the medical center has confined only an average of 50 to 60 of these patients for intensive treatment of the disease.
With this number of cases and 19 deaths for the first seven months of the year, the Philippine Red Cross (PRC) has warned that it may not have enough blood platelets that patients already in serious stage.
PRC director for Zamboanga Victor Liozo said that blood platelets processed from donated blood can be kept in storage for only four days. Thus even if there is enough blood supply, the processing of platelets may not catch up with the need in case of a dengue epidemic.
On the other hand, the regional health office said that it cannot declare if the reported number of dengue cases in Zamboanga can be called an outbreak or an epidemic.
DOH Regional Director Dr. Aristides Tan said that “per data, Zamboanga City is presently ‘above alert threshold’ but has not reached the epidemic threshold.”
He also said that it is only City Mayor Celso Lobregat and City Health Officer Rodel Agbulos, who can declare an outbreak or an epidemic because this function has already been devolved to local government units based on the Local Government Code of 1991.
He said that the DOH will only get in if the mayor and the city health officer declared an outbreak.
The DOH will help in the containment and control of the disease during outbreak however the local government unit will still be in the frontline, he said.
Before an outbreak can be declared statistics must be checked depending on the number of victims. The first level is the average, alert and outbreak while the higher level is that of an epidemic.
The City Health Office is waiting for the August figures if it will record more than 277 cases, then an outbreak will declared. (PNA/PIA9-BST)
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