Although not officially completed, the new Festival City Polyclinic was on Monday opened to offer services to the public.
During a walkthrough of the facility, Minister of Health Dr Frank Anthony described the opening as a “soft” one as works to complete the newly built facility are still ongoing.
According to the acting Chief Execu-tive Officer of the Georgetown Public Hospital (GPH) Robbie Rambarran, the health centre was recently transferred to the management of the GPH and based on the expected services, it would no longer be Festival City health centre but a polyclinic.
Anthony noted that generally a polyclinic would offer all the services of a health centre along with additional diagnostic services, including labs, and X-Rays. “So that’s the intention — to make sure that all these services are done right in this facility,” he said.
The minister added that the facility previously fell under the purview of the Regional Health Services but the ministry thought that it would be best to have the management of the facility covered directly under the GPH.
“So, today, we are not launching or opening in a big way because there’s still a lot of stuff to be done but we thought it’s important,” the minister said, while noting that for the Festival City health centre, the authorities were renting another location which was not up to requirements.
Anthony stated that rather than wait until every single thing is finished at the new building, it was important to have it open and build up the services as time goes by. The authorities, he said, will ensure that the unfinished works are completed but a decision was made to start operationalising the service.
“We are not at the optimum, we are just starting, but over time you are going to see more doctors here, dentists, rehab people, nurses, and so forth who are going to be coming here,” Anthony explained. While the minister acknowledged that he did not have the exact figure as to how much was spent on the facility, he offered that in excess of $300 million has been spent thus far.
However, it was pointed out that the project with the current contractor has come to an end although as there were works in the contract still to be completed. “We will have to evaluate, see what remains to be done and then we will have to go out and get another contractor to finish that off so I estimate that maybe sometime next year we will have to go and get additional monies to be able to complete the remaining works,” Anthony indicated.
Meanwhile, he said that while currently there were only two doctors on staff at the time, the intention is to have more doctors at the facility in order to cater to many more patients. With the number of services that the facility is set to offer, he informed that patients would have no need to go to other facilities to get imaging, tests and more done.
Further, the facility will also include a section for dentistry and so dentists from the Cheddi Jagan Dental School will be working out of the facility, though the intention is to eventually have permanent dental staff. When completed, the polyclinic will also offer rehabilitation services
Doctor-in-charge of the facility Judy Bentley-Browne noted that currently the polyclinic is offering preventative care and healthcare for patients with chronic diseases, such as diabetes and hypertension. The polyclinic also offers currently child healthcare, mental health care and adolescent home visits. Bentley-Browne also disclosed that staff from the former Festival City Health Centre along with staff from the North East La Penitence Health Centre are operating at the facility as the latter is undergoing renovations.
