Singapore doctors are angry for their patients at the Ministry of Health for legislating a limit of 6 patient visits a week.
The doctors said many of their patients are in serious conditions and they could not wait to queue.
The director from HeartlandHealth medical clinics, Wesley Chee, told the state media that patients are missing important appointments that could endanger their lives:
“What happens to the seventh or eighth patient in line if they have conditions requiring urgent treatment? The initial phases after the surgery requires a lot more attention, particularly if it involves the joint. If you do not have any hands-on attention to move the joint through a range of movement, they may develop complications, which counteract the effects of surgery.”
The Singapore government has earlier advised doctors to use video conference to see patients, but doctors and medical practitioners are saying it is ineffective. Singapore Physiotherapy Association president Lee Sin Yi, said:
“The lack of face-to-face interaction makes it difficult to progress any kind of intervention, especially when the physiotherapists are unable to conduct hands-on assessment of their patient.”
Another doctor, Dr Michael Lai, is more critical and openly complained about the Ministry of Health:
“Podiatrists regularly see diabetic patients, and these patients who might have foot ulcers would require wound care at least once a week, for example. Left untreated, the wounds could become infected. They are not going to heal in one week. So that means for a whole month, I am just treating six people… The cap on patient numbers does not make sense, and there is no way these patients can be treated via teleconsultations. It does not make sense. It is a hard limit. It is asking us to arbitrarily ration out patient care to only a few people who need it urgently. What would happen to the rest of the patients, who also need treatment urgently?”