Hospitals urged to set higher service standards<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Hospitals in Indonesia should set higher
\nstandards of services and professionalism to survive global
\ncompetition, the chairman of the Indonesian Hospital Association
\nsays.<\/p>\n
The first thing that hospital management and personnel must do
\nis shed the prevailing attitude that patients need them more than
\nthey need patients, Samsi Jacobalis said on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\"No matter how bad their services are, they believe patients
\nwill always come back,\" Samsi said during a media briefing at
\nPelni Hospital to announce the association's plan to hold a
\ncongress on Nov. 25-28 in Jakarta.<\/p>\n
Current services standards are simply inadequate, he said.<\/p>\n
\"Medical services providers should set new standards that put
\ncustomer, or patient, satisfaction first,\" said the dean of the
\nTarumanagara University School of Medicine.<\/p>\n
Samsi warned of the growing competition facing hospitals and
\ndoctors. Now that foreign investors are permitted to build
\nhospitals in the country more foreign physicians are coming to
\nwork here.<\/p>\n
He said hospitals must also keep up with changes in medical
\ntechnology and in customer expectations.<\/p>\n
\"If we continue the old practices without considering changes
\nin the medical world, patients will abandon us,\" he said.<\/p>\n
Many wealthy Indonesians already go abroad for medical
\ntreatment, mostly to neighboring Singapore where the quality of
\nservices are superior, he said.<\/p>\n
\"We are far below the United States and Europe, and even
\nSingapore and Malaysia,\" Samsi said.<\/p>\n
He said Indonesia has seven years to prepare itself before the
\ngovernment fully opens the medical sector to foreign investors
\nand doctors.<\/p>\n
On another issue, Samsi questioned the effectiveness of the
\ngovernment's policy requiring luxury hospitals to allocate 10
\npercent of their beds for poor people.<\/p>\n
\"We know that poor people are afraid to even enter luxury
\nhospitals,\" he said.<\/p>\n
It would be more effective if the hospitals were required to
\ntreat the poor by taking their services to a community, he said.<\/p>\n
He also called on the government to establish a national
\nstrategy for the medical industry, not only to deal with the
\ngrowing foreign competition but also to deal with the perennial
\nquestion of funding health services for the poor.<\/p>\n
There are currently 1,039 hospitals in Indonesia, comprising
\n835 general hospitals and 204 specialized hospitals. Of these,
\n524 hospitals are run by the government and the rest by private
\noperators. (ste)<\/p>",
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"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
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