The new evening clinics at Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) allow patients to access specialised care faster, and it will cater to more than 20,000 patients within three months. Evening clinics also make a significant impact on patient waiting times and improve patient satisfaction and care, said a senior official yesterday.
“We are looking at giving people more access to the healthcare services and address patient needs. Evening clinics are one way to improve access to outpatient services for patients,” said Deputy Chief of Quality for the Center for Patient Experience and Staff Engagement, at HMC Nasser Al Naimi, speaking on the sidelines of opening evening clinics at the Bone and Joint Center.
HMC commenced evening clinics on May 1, at the Ambulatory Care Center (ACC) for specialties that are in high demand. - ophthalmology, ear, nose and throat, urology, and audiology.
“This (Bone and Joint Center) is the second stage of opening evening clinics. At the Bone and Joint Center, we will serve around 13,000 patients within 90 days; Last week we opened evening clinics at the ACC and there we aim to serve 10,000 patients within 90 days,” said Al Naimi.
“These new clinics will provide additional capacity to care for patients and reduce wait times for appointments,” he said adding that within a week around 1000 patients were seen at ACC’s evening clinics.
However, he said about 20% of the patients have missed their appointments at ACC’s evening clinics and urged patients to adhere to their appointments or reschedule them if they are unable to attend.
“Evening clinics are like premier services. When patients don’t show up for appointments it affects the schedules of doctors and nurses and appointments of other patients. Based on last week’s data we have done 205 overbooking this week,” said Al Naimi.
The Bone and Joint Center runs 22 new evening clinics from Sunday to Wednesday for many orthopedic sub-specialties.
“At the evening clinics are mainly serving new patients, post-operative cases, post-MRI patients, fracture, and urgent cases; we aim at seeing around 5000 patients within a month at Bone and Joint Center’s evening clinics,” said Dr. Ahmed Mehzar, an orthopedic specialist at Bone and Joint Center.
“Four of the specialized clinics will see cases related to trauma and fractures. Other 18 clinics will cover all subspecialties in the orthopedic service, including spine, hip, knee, shoulder and elbow, hand, orthopedic oncology, pediatric orthopedic, foot and ankle, and sports injuries,” he added.
Patients are encouraged to use the helpline 16060 for customer service “Nesma’ak”, which is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
