Chiang mai hospital award for heart attack programme

The programme implemented by the Maharaj Nakorn Chiang Mai Hospital's Faculty of Medicine, Chiang Mai University is among eight public programmes - out of 600 submitted - to win the United Nations Public Service Awards 2009.

"This is the first time a Thai programme has received this prestigious award," the faculty's dean Dr Niwes Nanthachit said yesterday.

 "The goal of this programme is to improve public medical service through hospital networks working together," Niwes said. "Our focus is to ensure an efficient referring system[between hospitals], which is crucial to saving patients' lives".

The hospital's executives and Dr Tossaporn Sirisamphan, secretarygeneral of the Office of Public Sector Development, received the plaque and certificate of honour at the UN headquarters in New York on June 23.

Narain Chotirosniramit, assistant dean of Chiang Mai University's Faculty of Medicine, said the winning programme had created a network of hospitals in 17 northern provinces to ensure that referring patients would be efficient and fast.

"We seek to ensure that referring a patient will take less than half an hour," Dr Rangsarit Kanchanavanich said.

The number of heartdisease patients' deaths in Thailand is markedly higher than in other countries.

"The main reason is that patients do not get medical help in time. Available figures show just 52 per cent of coronary artery diseases received surgery during emergencies. This means we should improve the referring system," Rangsarit said.

The programme introduced by Maharaj Nakorn Chiang Mai Hospital simplifies the patient referral process. Also, it has initiated training courses for community, district and provincial hospitals to help them improve medical personnel skills and knowledge in managing complicated conditions by themselves before referring patients.

The training helps reduce costs for patients seeking medical care from the Maharaj Nakorn Chiang Mai Hospital and improves patient access to quality health care from their local hospitals. The average service time in outpatient and emergency departments has decreased considerably, coming down to no waiting time at all in 2008.

Prehospital death rates also decreased, especially for patients with cardiac problems. Through knowledge transfer and academic support from the Maharaj Nakorn Chiang Mai Hospital, many community and provincial hospitals both in Chiang Mai and other provinces are able to develop their own fast track programs. Finally, patient satisfaction surveys yielded positive results.