Consisted of the complex topography, the improvement of health care quality in West Papua faces some obstacles. Besides the condition of nature, many locals still adhere to their cultural beliefs in practicing traditional health treatment. These rituals in medical practice often make it difficult for the health sector in West Papua to develop significantly.
In the following years, some efforts taken to improve health care quality. The goal is to create better health services in the community. To aim for the goal, the government and related stakeholders implement some programs for the sake of the improvement of health care quality. What are the efforts they implement? Read the following article.
Providing Mobile Clinic
As many locals with different ethnicities live spreadly in lowlands, highlands, and valleys of West Papua, the provincial health office launch the mobile clinic program. In this case, medical personnel try to be more proactive to raise community awareness toward the importance of health.
By providing the mobile clinic, the local people do not need to go to the public health center to have a medical check-up. Otherwise, the health workers will come to visit them, including those people who reside in remote areas.
This mobile clinic is divided into three groups: floating doctor service, barefoot doctor service, and air doctor service. These groups will reach the locals to give treatment and deliver health care services.
The teams from three groups consist of doctors, nurses, midwives, nutritionists, sanitarians, health analysts, pharmacists, and health promotion personnel. They will deliver the health care service in three ways.
The teams from floating doctor service will promote the health care service and visit the local residences by crossing the river, lake, even sea to perform health care.
On the other hand, the teams from the barefoot doctor service will visit the community through the land route. They will climb the mountain and go down the forest to treat the patients in a remote area. Meanwhile, the medical workers from the air doctor service will reach the locals by using a helicopter or a small plane to save time.
Allocating the Budget to Build Public Health Centers
The inequality of the distribution of public health centers and the medical workers becomes a serious issue that the government in West Papua face. To solve the issue, the government allocates the budget to build some public health centers in some districts. The building of public health centers is the answer to the questions of the government effort to improve health care quality.
To facilitate the access of the communities to public health centers, the government also extends the network of health care services. The local people can reach the closest public health services near their residency, like auxiliary public health centers, integrated health posts, mobile public health centers, village health posts, and village-level labor or delivery posts.
Launching Papua Barat Sehat Program
One of the efforts to improve the health care quality in West Papua is by launching the Papua Barat Sehat Program. This program aims to raise awareness of the importance of health in remote places.
In this program, the governor and Health Office of West Papua recruit medical workers to fill the vacant position in some public health centers in some areas. They recruit doctors, dentists, nurses, pharmacists, midwives, health and environment analysts, nutritionists, and public health professionals. Those health workers will work in public health centers in remote areas for a year. They will devote themselves to promote health care as well as serve medical treatment to the locals there.
Collaborating with KOMPAK
Another effort the government to do to improve the health care quality is by collaborating with KOMPAK. KOMPAK stands for Kolaborasi Masyarakat dan Pelayanan untuk Kesejahteraan (Community Collaboration and Services for Welfare). This is Australia and Indonesia Partnership Program.
KOMPAK collaborates with the government, stakeholders, and medical workers in West Papua to present various innovations to deliver more effective and efficient health services.
One of the visions of KOMPAK tries to implement is to promote health care is by strengthening the health and nutrition policies and regulation at the district level. They also provide some equipment to distribute medical supplies in remote areas. Besides that, they launch a mobile application for the midwives to facilitate health services to pregnant women.
The community and the organization also invite the local people to attend the seminar. The purpose of holding a health seminar in some remote areas is to inform them about health issues. The local people will find out information about the importance of health care and try to visit the doctor to have medical treatment.
Conclusion
The improvement of health care quality in West Papua shows positive signs. Some efforts were taken to provide better health services, including in some remote areas.
Therefore, the establishment of public health care and the recruitment of medical professionals will not stop until all people receive better medical treatment and the quality of health shows some significant improvements.
