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www.ipohecho.com.my LOOKING FOR FREE COPY PART TIME IPOH echoechoYour Voice In The Community July 1-15, 2011 PP 14252/10/2011(026531) 30 SEN FOR DELIVERY TO YOUR DOORSTEP – ISSUE ASK YOUR NEWSVENDOR 123 Bracing For Tougher Times Update On Bus Old Does Not Arts & Culture Equal Heritage Around The World Services For Perak In 80 Minutes Perak Choral PG 3 PGS 6 Festival PG 8 PG 12 By James Gough Comes Of Age PCSH By James Gough The original Perak Chinese Maternity Hospital. he Perak Chinese Maternity Hospital which started 107 years ago has come a long way from its Thumble beginnings as a 6-bedded maternity home in a wooden house located at Chamberlain Road (now Jalan C.M. Yussuf) in 1904. It then shifted to a 3-storey hospital in 1938, at its current location in Jalan Raja Permaisuri Bainun (formerly Kampar Road). In 1968, it became a multi- disciplinary hospital and in 2003, changed its name to Perak Community Specialist Hospital (“PCSH”). Continued on page 2 2 July 1-15, 2011 IPOH ECHO Your Voice In The Community Affordable Quality Healthcare CSH has changed and evolved its services through the years. However, there is one aspect of its Poriginal charter that has remained constant and that is “to provide affordable quality healthcare to the Perak community”. Background The origin of PCSH is linked to the discovery of tin in the Kinta Valley in 1879, which resulted in the population of Kinta District growing tenfold from 5,500 to 60,000 by 1889. Ipoh was the largest settlement in Kinta and by 1893 was a town with road and rail links. The authorities had built hospitals at Ipoh, Batu Gajah and Gopeng, with beriberi, dysentery and fever then being the common diseases. However, the immigrant Chinese mining community’s proclivity for larger families created a demand for maternity services such as delivery of babies, particularly for the poor amongst them. The Beginning Thus in 1904 the Perak Chinese Maternity Hospital was established under the guidance by the then Protector of Chinese for Perak – Mr William Cowan, the District Surgeon – Dr. R.M. Connolly, and Community Leaders – Mr Foo Choo Choon and Mr Leong Fee. qualified team. In 1995 the hospital set up an intensive care by cash with most of them not owning a medical card”. The Chamberlain Road site for the original maternity unit and recruited its first full-time resident consultant. “Overall our rates are closer to General Hospital’s home was donated by Mr Cheah Cheang Lim, J.P., a rates. Hence we have become a general hospital for the nephew of Mr Foo. Funding was entirely by public 2003: ISO Certification and Name Change community, for those who would like to have specialist donations. It was one of three hospitals to achieve ISO medical services but cannot afford private hospital In 1923, the responsibility for running the hospital 9001/2001 Quality Management System Certification rates.” was taken up by the Perak Chinese Maternity Association, in 2003. That same year, it changed its name to Perak One of PCSH’s attractiveness is its ability to newly formed as a charitable association “to provide free Community Specialist Hospital reflecting its evolution to provide a fixed-price quotation to patients for standard and good services to the working class and the poor”, a multidisciplinary hospital. treatments. For example, providing a quote for a total and one of its main functions then was to provide free The hospital now offers several specialist services, knee replacement at RM16K all-in. Once they provide maternity services and train midwives. including Orthopaedics, General Surgery, Cardiology, the quotation, they stick to it. “For a lot of our patients, Urology, Paediatrics and Ear, Nose and Throat. It acquired Midwife Training the first Lithoptripter machine in Perak to remove kidney The training of midwives was an important function stones non-invasively through shock-wave therapy. for the hospital. Due to the economic progress from the According to Rajindar Singh, the hospital’s CEO, growth of the tin and rubber industries, rural communities “upgrading work is still going on but on a prioritized began sprouting up around the state and a baby boom basis”. A new liquefied oxygen system was recently soon followed. installed to provide clean and quality oxygen for patients, The limited number of qualified doctors made the with the old system being used as a backup. role of the trained midwives critical in reaching out to The family of the late Dato’ K.K. Lim recently the remote rural communities to provide safe delivery of donated medical equipment, worth some RM300K, to babies and care to their mothers. help boost the level of patient care at the hospital. In 1937, the hospital’s Medical Superintendent, Other new equipment ordered includes state-of- Dato’ Dr. Khong Kam Tak, with support from the public the-art endoscopy equipment costing RM300K and an and NGOs, raised $179,000 to build the main hospital anaesthesiologist work station for the operation theatre Upgraded waiting room on Ward 2 building at its current site. This was officially opened in costing RM400K. The facility upgrades include their 1939 by the then High Commissioner of the Federated recently refurbished Ward 2 while renovations of the a firm quotation is a point of comfort, a sort of budget Malay States, Sir Thomas S.W. Thomas, G.C.M, O.B.E. paediatric ward and maternity ward rooms are on-going. which they will work towards and not have to worry about At its peak, the hospital delivered more than 3,300 “Our upgrades also include service process upgrades cost overruns,” explained Rajindar, who has a business babies annually. However as healthcare services in the state such as customer service and admission and discharge management background and worked with a German later improved, the hospital experienced reduced demand programmes,” added Rajindar. “Of our 110 nurses, some medical company for 25 years. for maternity services and the training of midwives was 25% have gone for skill upgrading programmes. Human discontinued in 1968. During all those years, the hospital equity is an important asset to a hospital”. Hospital CSR Unchanged had no resident doctors, but was run by a Matron with PCSH carries its share of social responsibility, providing midwives, assisted by a panel of local volunteer doctors. Maintaining the Mission free medical services to the aged, orphans and deserving Rajindar reiterated the hospital’s mission “to provide charity cases. Over three months of this year, it held Non-Profit Institution affordable health care to the Perak community”. medical camps, providing free consultation and treatment PCSH, as a non for-profit institution, has been “Our room rates which start as low as RM35 per to 1,600 patients from low-income groups and Orang Asli supported by charitable contributions from the community, night are reasonable. Our patient breakdown is 10% rich communities. philanthropists and its leaders. Its past Presidents have and 20% well to do. The rest of our patients pay their bill The hospital is still managed by the Perak Chinese included Mr. Leong Sin Nam, Foo Choong Yit, Dato’ Seri Maternity Association, whose current President is Dato’ Lau Pak Khuan, Dato’ Peh Seng Koon, Dato’ Chong Wai Lee Hau Hian, and its directors include Dato’ Lim Si Weng, Tan Sri Dato’ Seri Lee Loy Seng and Dato’ Chin Boon and the current Medical Superintendent, Dato’ Dr Pek Soo. Y.C. Lee of Lee Eye Centre. Over the next 40 years, the hospital gradually evolved Apparently the original good intention of the hospital from providing only maternity services to becoming “to provide affordable quality healthcare,” despite the a multi-disciplinary specialist hospital and this led to current challenging environment of rising medical costs, is periodical upgrading and expansion of its facilities. still being maintained. Now isn’t that a warming thought! In 1987, an annexe building was constructed and a full scale X-ray department was set up. Its Haemodialysis Centre with 30 dialysis machines capable of servicing 1,000 patient sessions per month, was officially opened in 1994, and is managed by a full-time nephrologist and a Cheah Cheang Lim donated the land to build the first 6-bed Perak Chinese Maternity Hospital in 1904 Haemodialysis section Lithotripsy Machine Your Voice In The Community IPOH ECHO July 1-15, 2011 3 IPOHecho Bracing For Tougher Times From the Editor’s Desk Bottom line is, inflation has affected us in more ways than ever. The government can no by Fathol Zaman Bukhari longer hide the truth from the public. Will a resource-rich country like ours go the way of Greece? The inevitable may happen… he impact brought about by the hike in electricity canola) has gone up by as much as RM5. It may not affect rates and the removal of diesel subsidies for those in the upper-middle and higher-income brackets but Thauliers and deep-sea fishing vessels effective it will certainly affect the working class, the lower and the June 1 is already being felt. The sudden rise in energy middle-income groups. costs has caught many by surprise. Prices of fish and fast- The diesel subsidy removal for deep-sea fishing moving-consumer goods have escalated beyond the 20- had owners up in arms. Their fleet of over 1,200 vessels percent margin predicted by market analysts following the nation-wide did not go to sea, as promised. The result announcement. Goods with fewer substitutes and higher was immediate. Fish became scarce; prices skyrocketed demand experience a faster price increase while those causing housewives to scout the markets for cheaper which could be substituted witness a slower increase.