Helmet Doctor Project was launched with idea based on reduction of the referral of the patient to the higher center. Such situation was based on the fact that the pandemic of COVID 19 demands reduced movements of the people. The approach to basic medical needs launched by the Government of Nepal Was already in place mostly dominated by vocational trainers in medical field. In such condition role of medical doctor was sought to be effective. The local collaborators have duty to combat the pandemic as well as to provide regular health service in the area. During these periods the local collaborators has done remarkable job in managing the COVID 19 cases and in the process of upgrading health delivery system.
The specific objectives at the start of the program are
Palungtar Municipality is the project area, located in Gorkha District in Gandaki Pradesh, central Nepal.
It has estimated population of 38000 and serves the basic medical needs to the public via health posts and urban community centers. It has hilly terrain and roads are under construction.
| S.N | Activities |
|---|---|
| 1 | Transportation of the medicine to the local community |
| 2 | ONE MBBS doctor is allocated in the birthing center, Dhatipokhari |
| 3 | The outreach clinics run in ten different wards based on health delivery mechanism and catchment area. |
| 4 | Proposal of building hospital in Changli area in semi constructed building site and upgrading birthing center with facilities like X-ray machine, portable ultrasound and laboratory instruments to upgrade the investigations facilities. |
The name helmet denotes the difficult terrain and poor developmental indicators in health approach to the public. Medical doctors with some extra skills can bring a lot of impact to the local community. But only a face of medical graduate is not enough to improvise the referral system with in the local community and centralized health care. The doctors have to depend on the evidence-based facts. Simple problems with antenatal scan, urine cultures, important blood works, X-ray, will be effective to control more than 95% of cases. Some perspectives how the project should move further has been listed below,
The only benefit of the project is that it replaces the vocationally trained health workers by the medical graduates in the decision making regarding the referral of the patients. The vocationally trained personnel have specific jobs allocated by the government of Nepal. Due to poor development of roads, travel and in addition to the pandemic situation has demanded medical graduate to work in remote areas. While the numbers of the medical graduates are increasing, this project should have long term vision to help upgrading the local health facility in addition to the government efforts. The project area will be independent on their own when government will provide medical graduates in these areas. While the helmet doctor concept can provide accelerant to make more remote areas independent.
