A history of under-investment in public hospitals and low expectations in enforcing care and hygiene standards underpins the cycle of neglect which limits public confidence in Bangladesh’s hospital system.
While financial constraints are sometimes unavoidable, there is no excuse for poor management in maintaining hygiene and post-operative care standards.
Bangladesh has made commendable progress in raising life expectancy, ensuring immunisation, and increasing access to medicines. There is no reason why these successes cannot be spread to helping to improve the quality of care in our hospitals.
It is a sad fact of life that concerns about care quality apply to many of our hospitals, in both the public and private sectors. Were this not the case, we would see fewer affluent and influential people habitually fly abroad when they need medical treatment.
The low standards of care in Bangladesh’s hospitals were recently highlighted in the low ranking, 79th out of 80, given by the 2015 EIU Quality of Death Index, measuring the quality of palliative care provided for the terminally-ill, and chronically bed-ridden.
Although some aspects of this low score, such as expensive drugs and dialysis for patients with cancer and acute renal failures, may primarily be a matter of resources, the deeper problem lies in poor management of the resources we do have available.
Better management is urgently needed to improve care quality standards.
The government should work with universities and hospitals to increase investment in improving the skills and training of medical and health care professionals. There is no reason why, with our large demographic dividend, we cannot plan to train much greater numbers of skilled professionals.
Good quality hospital care and treatment is an everyday need, not a luxury. Our growing and ageing population deserves to see substantive initiatives to improve care quality and increase long term health care provision.