The Medical Association of Malta has appealed to the Maltese public, particularly those who have elderly relatives requiring hospitalisation, to do their utmost to take care of their elderly relatives when they are discharged from hospital.

"It is unfortunate that, although the majority of Maltese families continue to uphold traditional family values, an increasing number of people try to put pressure on medical staff not to discharge the patients who are otherwise fit for discharge because of the inconvenience this might cause them, while others completely fail in their responsibilities and abandon their elderly relatives to their devices," the doctors' union said.

"This situation is causing acute hospital bed shortages at Mater Dei Hospital and around 80 beds could be blocked by such patients at any one time. This amounts to 10% of all hospital beds and around 30% of all acute medical beds."

The association said that when these situations occured there was no other option but to try to admit these elderly patients to rehabilitation beds in Karin Grech Hospital, but although the number of such beds has increased the demand still exceeded supply.

The association referred to recent comments by Parliamentary Secretary for Health Dr Joe Cassar regarding the need for post‐operative patients to be nursed at home, stating that through a reinforcement of the primary health care system it would be possible to shorten the post‐operative hospital stay after certain operations and increase the number of day case surgeries.

"However as pointed out by the Parliamentary Secretary, this would also require cooperation from family members to support the discharge of these patient."

The association stressed that whenever patients are discharged home, all the factors are taken into consideration including the medical condition of the patient as well as the family environment to which the patient is being discharged.

While patients who required a certain intensity of medical care would continue to be kept in hospital until fit for discharge, there were situations where if the right family support was available, discharge from hospital could be effected one or two days earlier, the association said. This would help increase the availability of hospital beds.

It said it was aware of the overall shortage of nursing home beds for the elderly and sympathised with those families who shouldered the burden of caring for their elderly ones without relying on the state resources.

The MAM urged Social Policy Minister John Dalli and his parliamentary secretaries to do their utmost to create more long term rehabilitation and nursing home beds to meet the demands of the ageing population of Malta.

See also

http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090209/local/relatives-urged-to-take-care-of-post-op-patients