By Dolly Yasa
BACOLOD City – Mayor Evelio Leonardia ordered the reopening of the Respiratory Outpatient Center to cater to the rising number of outpatients lining at the Corazon Locsin Montelibano Memorial Regional Hospital (CLMMRH).
The long queue of patients outside the hospital has caught the attention of the mainstream and social media.
Most of the patients are from the province and they have been returning to the hospital for several times to get a spot for consultations.
Some slept on the sidewalk just to get a queuing number which could take days.
Bacolod City Administrator Em Ang said CLMMRH can only cater to a certain number of out-patients on a daily basis due to the COVID-19 crisis.
On Wednesday night, the City Disaster Risk Reduction Management Office brought the patients waiting outside the CLMMRH to the Bacolod Respiratory Outpatient Center.
They were served hot meals for breakfast.
Ang said that to further decongest CLMMRH, Bacolodnons needing consultation are advised to go to their respective barangay health centers to avail of health care services.
The Respiratory Outpatient Center was meant to attend to patients at the height of the COVID-19 crisis while Bacolod City was under Enhanced Community Quarantine.
It will reopen starting 8 a.m. today, with doctors who will attend to patients with general ailments.
“It will be open to Bacolodnons and non-residents, we will not discriminate,” Leonardia said.
He said that at 11 p.m. Wednesday night, a city government team brought 12 patients, 11 of whom were not from Bacolod.
Negros Occidental Gov. Eugenio Jose Lacson said he will look into the problem of sick people having to spend the night sleeping on the sidewalk in front of the CLMMRH.
Most of them are from outside Bacolod.
Lacson said he will talk to Dr. Julius Drilon, CLMMRH chief, to see if anything can be done to address the problem, noting that the hospital is overwhelmed by the number of patients.
Lacson said that before, non-COVID-19 patients avoided hospitals thinking they would get sick from the virus, however, “what’s happening is there is more confidence so they are now going back for treatment.”
Drilon said the hospital’s outpatient department can only accept 120 outpatients from 8 a.m. until noon daily, except Saturdays and Sundays.
About 38 patients of various ailments were treated at the Respiratory Center, Ang said.
