Picture 2 taken from
Picture 3 taken from
The Flying Doctor Service
General hospitals and government clinics are easily found in
cities, towns, villages, and FELDA settlements. The same cannot, however, be
said for rural areas especially in East Malaysia. Roads and streets that
connect rural dwellers to cities are still scarce in most Sabahan and
Sarawakian districts. And the lack of connecting routes has made it that much
harder for clinics to be built closer to rural dwellers.
To address this issue of out of reach patients, Ministry of
Health and Malaysian Royal Air force have joined sources to run the Flying
Doctor Service for the last 30 years. FDS is for those who live in areas which
are unreachable through land transports.
In Sabah, two teams of FDS, in Kota Kinabalu and Sandakan,
provide medical services to 11 Sabahan districts. The Kota Kinabalu team
catered to 34 villages last year alone, while the Sandakan team handled 29
villages. The FDS teams visit these villages on a rotational schedule, five
times a week.
In Sarawak, the FDS teams are centered in Kuching, Sibu, and
Miri where they attend to 141 remote areas. One FDS team usually consists of a
medical officer, medical assistant, and two nurses.
The FDS provides preventive and curative services such as
general practice, follow-up treatments for hyper tensional and diabetic
patients. The teams also focus on maternal and child healthcare, as they are
aiming to increase Sabahan children immunization coverage. FDS also transports
patients to hospitals and brings in supplies of medicine to rural health
clinics.
Although we have a long way to go in bringing adequate
healthcare to all Malaysians, especially those in remote areas, the Flying
Doctor Service is a good effort at bridging that gap.
And I say, this is one of the nice things we Malaysians
have.
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