Healthcare Personnel Shortage and Solutions Continued (The Concept of Mobile Clinics, Improved Collaboration and Referral Process)

Mobile Clinics

Mobile Clinics are used in many parts of the world to deliver healthcare services to members of the population that may not have immediate access to healthcare. These are specially designed buses that are fully equipped with basic healthcare supplies, and staffed with healthcare professionals, who travel from one remote community to another and deliver care to those in need. Mobile clinics can be utilized to deliver diverse services to a target population.  However, several factors need to be in place for a mobile clinic program to be successful, and these factors are listed below.

• Need doctors and nurses who can function in this role
• Requires government partnership and funding, because the patient population may lack the ability to pay for care delivered
• Can be funded by non-profit organizations and philanthropist, and this method of funding should be encouraged
• Recruitment of volunteer healthcare professionals is necessary to boost the workforce of a mobile clinic program, and decrease the cost of staffing.

Mobile clinics can be utilized for basic primary care; treatments and disease screening, immunization programs, and health campaigns. See diagram below:

The Collaboration and Referral Processes

Collaboration between healthcare providers is necessary for seamless healthcare delivery and improvement of patient outcomes. For example, if a patient with a severe cardiovascular problem goes to see a general medicine doctor who knows that the patient requires management by a cardiologist, the patient should immediately be referred to the specialist, and the generalist should carry out that consultation process to ensure that the patient is in good hands. This is sometimes lacking in Nigeria, with many providers delivering care beyond their expertise, and without seeking input from experts in particular fields of medicine, who could have influenced the quality of care rendered to the patient. In addition, patients are often left to find the experts they need to seek, and this happens after they have spent a lot of money obtaining care at a local hospital or clinic that could not address their medical problems.

To improve collaboration and referral, the following factors must be addressed:

• Doctors need to collaborate with other healthcare providers in the community
• Inter-institutional networking is essential to effective healthcare delivery because it allows for timely referral of patients from one institution to another based on their healthcare needs.
• The referral process should be transparent, timely, and altruistic, with the sole purpose of ensuring that the patient is sent to a place that can treat the disease process effectively. Profits should never be the driving force for a referral.
• The referral process should be well coordinated with detailed and necessary patient information communicated to the receiving doctor. Transportation should be facilitated to the receiving institution. See diagram below.
• We need to develop an inventory that list the names, contact information, and sub-specialties  for all healthcare providers within each state. This can be made available to providers and patients, making the navigation process easier when seeking consultation for complex health conditions.

 Written by Dr. Idongesit Udoh

Reference

Lehmann, U., Dieleman, M., & Martineau, T. (2008). Staffing remote rural areas in middle- and low-income countries: a literature review of attraction and retention. BMC Health Services Research, 8(19). DOI 10.1186/1472-6963-8-19.