Patient Community Meeting At Help

The Patient Community @ HELP -- Meeting held on 18th June 2011

The meeting began with a film on WHO conference in Jakarta on Patient Safety courtesy ICHA which brought out problems faced by patients and how patients and doctors work together to ensure patient safety.

The film brought out some comments from the members eg. patients feel that doctors have very little time for the patients and this results in the doctor not being able to clearly understand the patients\' problems. Following the viewing of the film we had a discussion on How To Talk To Your Doctor.

Developing and maintaining a good relation with your doctor will help you in getting better medical care for yourself. Taking some of the responsibility as a patient will go a long way in a patient receiving good treatment.

Some problems which the patients faced were highlighted as follows:

i) Doctors need to prescribe cheaper medicines wherever possible;
ii) Patients suspect that there is a nexus between a pathological laboratory and doctors to show certain medical problems in the results of the tests. The subject will be discussed in more depth in future meetings.
iii) There is a need for \'honest opinion\' from the doctor. The patients expressed their difficulty in seeking a second opinion but agreed that doctors are now open to their patients seeking opinion and that it was a part of the patients\' responsibility to get back to their doctor on their future course of action in that respect.
iv) Patients were a bit apprehensive whether they could contact their doctor after their consultation in case they needed a clarification. All agreed that doctors are now accessible through their assistants; email and sms -- patients just need to clarify the preferred mode of communication during the consultation.
v) Patients also feel that healthcare should be made more affordable.

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