Prime Minister Spencer on the Opening of Mt. St. John's Medical Centre

Address from Prime Minister the Hon. W. Baldwin Spencer on the Opening of Mount St. John’s Medical Centre

Salutations.

Today is a proud and historic day for the Antiguan and Barbudan people.
The completion and commissioning of the Mount St. John’s Medical Centre is a goal that has been long deferred.

Following, today’s activity, the Mount St. John’s Medical Centre medical staff will begin to welcome patients who will be transferred from Holberton Hospital. This will be a quantum leap in the quality of health services in Antigua and Barbuda.

The transfer of patients from Holberton to Mount St. John’s Medical Centre will commence this week from Saturday, the 21st February.

This Centre, Ladies and Gentlemen, has been planned, constructed and outfitted for sustainable service excellence for generations to come.

Today is very special as we gather here to witness and to celebrate the result of a successful collaborative effort between Complant, the Chinese contractors; the Government of Antigua and Barbuda, through the Ministries of Health, Finance and Public Works; the Medical Benefits Scheme a Statutory Corporation through which the finances of the people have been channelled in support of this project; and the American Hospital Management Company, our hospital consultants who have been working with and under the guidance of our local Board of Directors; as well as all of the professional and technical stakeholders at Holberton Hospital.

The completion of the Mount St. John’s Medical Centre is in delivery of what I see as the Government’s obligation to improve the quality of healthcare, and access to such health care as fundamentals for social and economic development in Antigua and Barbuda.

This purpose-built facility, as you are aware, replaces a cluster of old buildings which simply grew in an unplanned way and long ago became inadequate to the needs of the society.

The potential value of the on-site helicopter service for Barbuda, and other islands of the region, will not be lost on you. For most of us here this morning this will be a once-in-a-lifetime experience – the opening of a healthcare facility of this standard and dimension.

It is accepted that a hospital incorporates within its functional and structural arrangements:

• An office building
• An eating establishment
• A medical care agency and
• A major educational and social service institution.

Most of all, the hospital is an instrument of community health and a vital part of the total public health and medical care spectrum.

This encompasses prevention, diagnosis, rehabilitation, education and research; and all of this must revolve around the patient who must always come first.

Ladies and Gentlemen, we are acutely aware of the fiercely competing demands between what we want in terms of healthcare – for example, state of the art care – and the cost of delivering that care.

Indeed it is a universal truism that the demand for services will always outstrip our capacity to supply those services.

As a result, we will always be challenged to develop strategies and to find innovative ways in which we can meet the burgeoning demands.

In this regard we need to utilise all the services available to us to help to meet this demand.

For instance, Mount St. John’s Medical Centre proposes to develop a referral system between primary health care and specialist care to encourage appropriate and timely care and to reduce unnecessary queuing for specialist care at the hospital.

Again, by establishing a common electronic health record system, this would greatly enhance medical records storage, health care quality and continuity of care across multi-disciplinary healthcare providers.

This would also assist continuous monitoring of epidemiological changes in disease patterns and healthcare outcomes.

Further, this would allow for better planning for future healthcare resources and facilities.

In essence, we contend that where there is a single hospital in a small community such as ours, that hospital must work cooperatively with other health institutions through forward and backward linkages, to bring the best in knowledge and care to the people.

And we hope to do this by bringing all hands on board; the doctors, the administrators, the nurses, and the ancillary staff; even as we solicit the goodwill of the population in this quest.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Mount St. John’s Medical Centre will be guided by certain core values of dedication, integrity, excellence, health and vitality, wisdom and success.

Our caregivers are deeply conscious that these values can only be achieved by unwavering devotion to the needs of our population, by nurturing trust and respect, by enhancing teamwork and communication, by ensuring equal opportunity and by transparency and professionalism.

The core functions will be the delivery of quality secondary and tertiary services optimally configured to provide equitable access to efficient, high quality and cost effective care in an affordable and efficient manner, and to provide a training platform for all of its health professionals.

It will not be lost on you, Ladies and Gentlemen, that upon the commissioning of the hospital a number of benefits, real and potential will flow.

A number of these readily come to mind.

The brain drain from Antigua, especially of some of our well trained and qualified nurses is likely to subside.

The reason usually given for such migration is the issue of pay. However, research suggests that working conditions is a more important factor than pay; and in many cases, is an even more critical reason for leaving.

We are therefore of the view that the very excellent conditions I anticipate at MSJMC may well dampen the desire to leave Antigua for less welcoming climes.
It is reasonable to assume that we will, over time, see an improvement in the level of service with the acquisition of more diagnostic equipment and the assistance of IT applications in everyday caring procedures.

A number of highly trained Antiguan professionals living and practising abroad, as well as other accomplished Caribbean nationals, have expressed interest joining Mt. St. John.

Indeed MSJMC has already been able to recruit a number of nationals who have demonstrated excellence in their practices in hospitals in the USA and in the UK.
These additions to the existing professional teams, together with modern diagnostic and treatment tools and modalities, will reduce the need for Antiguans and Barbudans to seek medical treatment abroad.

With the introduction of effective and efficient forward and backward linkages between the levels of patient care, primary, secondary, and tertiary, it is anticipated that the overall resources (much of which are housed at the hospital level) will be better managed and utilised.

In this way, the new MSJMC will be used to its fullest as it seeks to support community units, nationwide.

Ladies and Gentlemen, that we have come this far at this time, as I have said before, is due to a fine collaborative effort by all stakeholders. But pulling all of this together, providing timely advice where needed, and keeping track of commitments and deadlines and critical paths to completion, have been members of the MSJMC Board of Directors under the Chairmanship of Mr. Cottrille George. Accordingly I would like to thank Mr. George and all the members of the Board for their leadership, hard work and dedication.
I would also like to thank the Staff of the American Hospital Management Company (AHMC) and their local administrative staff who have maintained their professionalism and commitment to service during these changing times.
Of equal importance, I would like to express my appreciation to the Doctors, Administrators, Nurses, Allied Professionals and other staff at Holberton who have demonstrated their goodwill in fostering a harmonious atmosphere even in the face of understandable apprehension that inevitably accompanies change.
It would be an injustice if the contribution Minister of Health John Maginley in bringing this project to fruition was not placed on public record.

This Minister deserves much credit for the successful completion of Mt. St. John Medical Centre.

Ladies and Gentlemen;

In concluding, I challenge the Board and the professional staff of Mt. St. John Medical Centre to add to their obligations a responsibility for public education programmes promoting healthy lifestyles and vigilance in protecting their health.
With this, and with the efficacy of care that this institution will deliver, local demand will be contained, and aimed at reducing the need local demand, and Mt. St. John Medical Centre can then become the hospital of the Eastern Caribbean countries.

I pray God’s blessings on all who work and are given care here.

May God Bless our nation.